Butterfly
Butterflies are flying insects that appear in many Mario series, though they typically aren't really important. In Super Mario Sunshine, Yoshi could eat yellow butterflies to get coins. Blue Butterflies had Blue Coins, and green ones had 1-Up Mushrooms. They usually appear in groups. There are also many creatures that have the similar appearance to a butterfly, such as Tippi from Super Paper Mario (who is occasionally actually classified as a butterfly, though Francis once refers to her as a "digibutterfly").
In Super Mario 64, there are a few stages (as well as outside Princess Peach's Castle) where there are butterflies flying around. When Mario punches one of them, one of two things will happen: The butterfly will either turn into a 1-Up Mushroom or become a large metal ball and chase Mario until it hits him, or hits something in its way.
Butterflies also made a small appearance in Mario Party; they are shown on the mini-game Ground Pound. They later appear in Mario Party 4 in the mini-game Butterfly Blitz. They have a small but major role; they are worth points when characters catch them. There are three kinds of butterflies that give players points to win; Yellow Butterflies are worth at least one point, Red Butterflies are worth two points, and Blue Butterflies are worth a whopping three points.
A butterfly also made a very breif appearance in the Mario Party 8 minigame, At The Chomp Wash, when a Chain Chomp sees it chases it into several buckets of paint.
