The Goofy NPC Dialogue of Efera & Jiliora

Onna Senshi Efera and Jiliora (“Lady Warriors Efera and Jiliora”) is a fantasy novel series by Reiko Hikawa from the late 1980s and early 1990s. While none of the novels were translated into English, there was an anime OVA adaptation, which was localized in North America by ADV Films under the name Gude Crest. There was also a Japan-only PC Engine CD action-RPG game based on the series called Efera & Jiliora: The Emblem from Darkness. It’s a pretty bad Ys clone that suffers from awkward controls, terrible balancing, and general jankiness, the typical kind of game where most of the budget was probably spent on the voice actors rather than development.

But it does have two high points – like Ys, it has some excellent music, plus it also has plenty of legitimately funny NPC dialogue. Some of it is the normal worldbuilding and storytelling stuff you’d find in any 16-bit RPG, but you’ll also find lots of off-kilter text – some will reveal their most random thoughts, others are unnecessarily hostile, and still others seem clearly aware that they’re in a video game. A few even insert emoticons into the text. It’s all the sort of thing you’d expect in a Working Designs game, except rather than being jokes inserted during localization, they’re a part of the original Japanese text. It seems like the dialogue writer got bored and decided to have some fun with it. Here are a few examples from the game’s first town.

“Why do I have to wander around this village all day?! I just want to go home already!”

“The consumption tax was abolished recently, so you don’t need to add 3% when buying weapons or medicine.”

“No matter how hard I work, I can’t afford to own a house in this town, where on earth am I supposed to live!!” (An increasingly modern sentiment.)

“This dress is the latest trend. Hmm, you guys are super lame….you’re not impressed! Why not?”

“Shut up! Stop talking to everyone! You guys are annoying pick-up artist jerks, even though you’re women.”

“My brother is a murderer. (;_;) But he already left the village. I wonder what he’s doing?”

“Hello hello! I haven’t seen your face around here. If you live in this village, let’s be friends. (^_^)”

“My name is Kokuji. Even if there is someone else who looks just like me, that’s not me.” (As one might gather, there are a lot of identical NPC sprites in this game.)

“I’m so pissed off! That cheapskate village chief keeps telling me he won’t lend his clothes to my grandson!”