Fruitbat Factory

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Fruitbat Factory is a Finland-based independent Japanese-to-English localization company, founded on February 10th, 2012 by Jakke Elonen and Ozhan Sen.^[1]^[2]^[3]

Company Goal

“Our mission is to let everyone enjoy the best Japanese games in English.”

―Jakke Elonen

Formation

Little Busters! (リトルバスターズ!), a Japanese visual novel, was released in Japan, on July 27th, 2007. Little Busters! was developed by Key and published by VisualArt.^[4] On February 10th, 2008, a group of fans named Team Fluffy began an unofficial English translation of Little Busters! as a passion project.^[5]

Ozhan Sen, under the name EchoMateria, was one of the first ones among Team Fluffy to work on the project, with his main job in editing graphics for the project. Jakke Elonen, under the name Phlebas, joined Team Fluffy as its script editor soon after, on November 2008.^[6]^[7] Further in the project's development, on July 2010, Tony Blomqvist, under the name Rive, began submitting error reports for the translation project and later officially joined Team Fluffy as its proofreader on December 2010.^[8]^[9] On December 18th, 2011, the translation of Little Busters! was completed and it was also announced that the translation of the other editions of Little Busters!, Little Busters! Ecstasy and Little Busters! Memorial Edition, will be the next project for Team Fluffy.^[10]^[11]

In early 2012, Ozhan Sen and Jakke Elonen were inspired to take an even more active role and expand the English-to-Japanese localization market, disappointed by the small amount of Japanese games getting localized. As a result, they decided to form the company Fruitbat Factory. Mr. Sen and Mr. Elonen contacted Yoshifumi Ishii, a translator the two enjoyed working with over the years, to join the new company, bringing the original staff count to three. When coming up with a name for the company, Jakke, at one point, said "That's such a fruitbat idea." and Ozhan liked the word "fruitbat", and so eventually this formed the name Fruitbat Factory.^[12] With the foundation laid out, Fruitbat Factory was formed on February 10th, 2012.^[3]

100% Orange Juice!

In 2013, Fruitbat Factory began talks with developer Orange_Juice about localizing 100% Orange Juice!, as Rockin' Android had opted not to make a translation for the game. 100% Orange Juice! was a 5-year anniversary game for Orange_Juice that was only marketed at Comiket 76, and subsequently had not sold well during its original 2009 JP release. After some discussion, Fruitbat Factory was allowed to localize the game, and in a risky move, decided to delay the game for 3 months for a Steam release with multiplayer to make the game easily playable. On May 16th, 2014, the game was released on Steam.

Unlike previous titles, however, sales of the game remained steady as opposed to dropping off after the initial release. Now able to prove a consistent userbase, Fruitbat Factory was able to convince Orange_Juice that gradually adding more content to expand the now five-year-old game could be worth it. This culminated in the release of the first DLC, the Syura & Nanako Character Pack, on October 15th, 2014, which was received very well by the community. Since the DLC's release, the company has gradually improved the game's detail and graphics, and added new DLCs every few months. In 2017, the company also hired more coders specifically for 100% Orange Juice! (growing their staff to ten), enabling them to create more complicated events than any of the previous ones. At the end of 2017, Fruitbat Factory released Scramble!! for an Xmas Miracle!, the first scripted and complex event for the game, which has since been followed by more intricate special events.^[13]

Starting in 2018, Fruitbat Factory started work on making a remake of the game in the Unity engine, with the goal of both modernizing the game's infrastructure as well as opening the door to port the game to other devices. However, in September 2023, Unity's announcement of their new policies to implement "runtime fees" into the engine caused the team to regrettably scrap the project. Not wanting to give up on the plan of modernizing the game, Fruitbat Factory decided to shift focus into upgrading the internal systems of the existing game to eventually make it more compatible with other platforms. As a result of these events, Fruitbat Factory started a Patreon in the pursuit of exploring alternative revenue streams to help support continued development.^[14]

Team Members

FBF Crew — Members of Fruitbat Factory, Ordered Left to Right (Yoshifumi Ishii, Tony Blomqvist, Jakke Elonen, and Ozhan Sen)

Jakke Elonen, CEO, Founding Partner, Project and Editing Lead
Ozhan Sen, Founding Partner, Graphics and Marketing Lead
Yoshifumi Ishii, Translation, Japanese Relations
Runa Daikai, Business Development Manager
Juan Gomez, Translation, Japanese Relations
Tony Blomqvist, Lead Programmer
Kyle Combs, Programmer
hexun, Programmer
Yulay Devlet, Senior Art Designer
Coffgirl, Art Designer
Justin "Ikuse" Khar, Art Designer
Haris Akbar, QA Lead
Cesar Oliver, Junior Programmer
Paulo "Blue Link" Naressi, Junior Programmer
Sora, Junior Programmer
Raphael Sampaio, Junior Programmer
Francisco Lázaro, Junior Programmer
Damian Wyszolmirski, Junior Programmer
Yoran Heling, Webmaster

Releases

War of the Human Tanks
99 Spirits
100% Orange Juice
QP Shooting - Dangerous!!
War of the Human Tanks - ALTeR
ManaCollect
200% Mixed Juice!
Eiyuu Senki - The World Conquest
Sora
Magical Eyes - Red is for Anguish
War of the Human Tanks - Limited Operations
ENIGMA:
Xmas Shooting - Scramble!!
Kamio Recoil
Miniature Garden
Neko Navy
Lionheart
SeaBed
Acceleration of SUGURI 2
Chuusotsu! 1st Graduation: Time After Time
Dungeon Girl
Neko Navy - Daydream Edition
Agartha
∀kashicforce
The Princess, the Stray Cat, and Matters of the Heart
The Princess, the Stray Cat, and Matters of the Heart 2
Seven Days
Chuusotsu! 1.5th Graduation: The Moving Castle
Flying Red Barrel
Forgotten Trace: Thanatos in Nostalgia
Jiangshi x Daoshi
MAMIYA
Treehouse Riddle

Image	Info	Image	Info
	Name: War of the Human Tanks Developer: Yakiniku Banzai Release Date: September 14th, 2012 Price: $9.99 USD		Name: 99 Spirits Developer: TORaIKI Release Date: May 31st, 2013 Price: $9.99 USD
	Name: 100% Orange Juice! Developer: Orange_Juice Release Date: September 10th, 2013 Price: $6.99 USD		Name: QP Shooting - Dangerous!! Developer: Orange_Juice Release Date: November 14th, 2014 Price: $7.99 USD
	Name: War of the Human Tanks - ALTeR Developer: Yakiniku Banzai Release Date: February 13th, 2015 Price: $12.99 USD		Name: ManaCollect Developer: Tazigen Clock Release Date: April 17th, 2015 Price: $6.99 USD
	Name: 200% Mixed Juice! Developer: Orange_Juice Release Date: October 23rd, 2015 Price: $6.99 USD		Name: Eiyuu Senki - The World Conquest Developer: Tenco Release Date: November 12th, 2015 Price: $39.99 USD
	Name: Sora Developer: Orange_Juice Release Date: January 5th, 2016 Price: $8.99 USD		Name: Magical Eyes - Red is for Anguish Developer: Pomera Studios Release Date: March 30th, 2016 Price: $14.99 USD
	Name: War of the Human Tanks - Limited Operations Developer: Yakiniku Banzai Release Date: June 13th 2016 Price: $9.99 USD		Name: ENIGMA: Developer: Uzumeya Release Date: November 15th, 2016 Price: $14.99 USD
	Name: Xmas Shooting - Scramble!! Developer: Orange_Juice Release Date: December 16th, 2016 Price: $4.99 USD		Name: Kamio Recoil Developer: Hanaji Games Release Date: December 21st, 2016 Price: $7.99 USD
	Name: Miniature Garden Developer: Muzintou Release Date: March 30th, 2017 Price: $19.99 USD		Name: Neko Navy Developer: DeathMofuMofu Release Date: June 14th, 2017 Price: $10.99 USD
	Name: Lionheart Developer: Shiisanmei Release Date: July 31st, 2017 No Longer Available^[15]		Name: SeaBed Developer: Paleontology Release Date: December 19th, 2017 Price: $19.99 USD
	Name: Acceleration of SUGURI 2 Developer: Orange_Juice Release Date: March 7th, 2018 Price: $8.99 USD		Name: Chuusotsu! 1st Graduation: Time After Time Developer: Studio Beast Release Date: April 24th, 2018 Price: $19.99 USD
	Name: Dungeon Girl Developer: Inu to Neko Release Date: July 30th, 2018 Price: $11.99 USD		Name: Neko Navy - Daydream Edition Developer: DeathMofuMofu Release Date: December 13th, 2018 Price: $12.99 USD
	Name: Agartha Developer: isao / NOCHI Release Date: March 20th, 2019 Price: $7.99 USD		Name: ∀kashicforce Developer: Endless Shirafu Release Date: March 29th, 2019 Price: $12.99 USD
	Name: The Princess, the Stray Cat, and Matters of the Heart Developer: TOKYOTOON Release Date: June 17th, 2019 Price: $19.99 USD		Name: The Princess, the Stray Cat, and Matters of the Heart 2 Developer: TOKYOTOON Release Date: November 8th, 2019 Price: $19.99 USD
	Name: Seven Days Developer: LIFE0 Release Date: December 13th, 2019 Price: $39.99 USD		Name: Chuusotsu! 1.5th Graduation- The Moving Castle Developer: Studio Beast Release Date: January 17th, 2020 Price: $9.99 USD
	Name: Flying Red Barrel Developer: Orange_Juice Release Date: June 19th, 2020 Price: $9.99 USD		Name: Forgotten Trace: Thanatos in Nostalgia Developer: Almaz Release Date: June 24th, 2020 Price: $9.99 USD
	Name: Jiangshi x Daoshi Developer: Dendo Denkido Release Date: July 16th, 2020 Free to Play		Name: MAMIYA Developer: Kenkou Land Release Date: April 30, 2021 Price: $19.99 USD
	Name: Treehouse Riddle Developer: Marudice Release Date: August 18, 2022 Price: $14.99 USD		Name: SeaBed Audio Novel Collection Developer: Paleontology Release Date: December 30, 2022 Price: $17.98 USD
	Name: Thistlemine Developer: Thistlebro Release Date: TBA Price: TBA

Crossovers

Bullet🍊

Image	Info
	Name: Bullet🍊 Publishers: Orange_Juice, Fruitbat Factory, and Level 99 Games Release Date: April 20, 2021 Price: $24.99 USD (requires Bullet♥︎ or Bullet★ base game)

References

External Links

[source0-1] About on Fruitbat Factory Website

[source1-2] About on Facebook

[source2-3] 3.0 ^3.1 Fruitbat Factory's first blog post

[source3-4] Little Busters! Official Website

[source8-5] Doki Fansub's page on Little Busters! translation project

[source4-6] EchoMateria starts of Little Busters! Translation

[source5-7] Phlebas Joins Team Fluffy

[source6-8] Rive's contributions to Fluffy's translation project

[source7-9] Rive Joins Team Fluffy

[source13-10] Little Busters! completed translation and next mission for Team Fluffy

[source14-11] Team Fluffy VNDB Page

[source15-12] Why "Fruitbat" was chosen

[source16-13] Interview with Jakke Elonen by wiki staff on 11/16/18.

[source18-14] Why we're starting a Patreon

[source17-15] Blog post reporting seperation between Fruitbat Factory and Shiisanmei and the removal of the game from Steam.

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