Festival
Festivals are events that occur during certain times of the year. They first appear in Epic Battle Fantasy 5, though similar effects happen in the fourth game and were cut from the third game.
Each Festival has a corresponding NPC that appears in the Warp Zone with a quest. Enemies have a chance to drop a Festival-specific item, which is used to both complete the Festival quest, and to upgrade some of the Festival-specific items. Drop rates for these items depend on which box is required to capture the foe; the bigger the box, the higher the drop rates (note that this is only used as a way to measure foe strength; it's not necessary to actually capture a foe for it to drop the items), with the foes requiring the largest box also having a chance of dropping a second item.
During a Festival, Equipment Shops will also have some exclusive items to sell, and some NPCs only appear during Festivals to gift the party a few items.
Multiple Festivals can run at the same time. In this case, enemies may drop each of the applicable festival items.
If you save in the Warp Zone, the location of the Festival NPCs is also saved, so if the active festival changes before you next load the game, you will need to exit the Warp Zone and return to update which NPCs are there.
Festival timing relies on the system clock, therefore you can cheat by changing the system clock or using applications such as RunAsDate (the latter method only works if you're playing the PC version and EBF5 CANNOT run on the x64 version).
Chinese New Year
The Chinese New Year Festival occurs between January 18 and February 25. It loosely corresponds with the Chinese Lunar New Year, which typically takes place sometime between the two given dates.
Effects
Foes may drop Red Envelopes.
An NPC named Jin appears in the Warp Zone. He has a quest that requires 10 Red Envelopes and 5 Gunpowder. The rewards are the Firecrackers skill and the Coin Charm flair.
Equipment shops sell the Lucky Fish flair for 888 coins.
Drop Rate
- Small box - 5%
- Medium box - 20%
- Big box - 50% x2
Valentine's Day
The Valentine's Day Festival occurs between February 7 and February 21, effectively covering the weeks before and after Valentine's Day (February 14).
Effects
Enemies may drop Heart Chocolates.
An NPC named Amy appears in the Warp Zone. She has a quest that requires 10 Heart Chocolates and 1 Cupcake. The reward is the Love Blade, 1 Diamond and 1 Espresso.
Equipment shops sell the Heart Pendant flair for 3000 coins.
Drop Rate
- Small box - 2.5%
- Medium box - 10%
- Big box - 25% x2
Easter
The Easter Festival occurs between March 14 and April 30.
Effects
Enemies may drop Easter Eggs.
An NPC named Bunni appears in the Warp Zone. She has a quest that requires 30 Easter Eggs and 1 Coffee. The reward is the Heaven's Voice bow, 1 The Holy Grail and 1 Orange Juice.
Equipment shops sell the Slime Staff for 60,000 coins.
Drop Rate
- Small box - 7.5%
- Medium box - 30%
- Big box - 75% x2
Halloween
The Halloween Festival occurs between October 1 and November 7.
Effects
Enemies may drop Halloween Candy.
An NPC named Jack appears in the Warp Zone. She has a quest that requires 25 Halloween Candy and 3 Pumpkins. The reward is the Coat of Teeth, Spider Gown and 20 Pumpkins.
Equipment shops sell the Pumpkin Head and the Spider Bobble for 300 coins each.
An NPC named Necron appears in the slime cat screen of the Mystic Woods. He gives the party 10 Halloween Candies and 2 Dark Runes.
Drop Rate
- Small box - 5%
- Medium box - 20%
- Big box - 50% x2
Christmas
The Christmas Festival occurs between December 1 and January 7.
Effects
Enemies may drop Candy Canes.
An NPC named Sally appears in the Warp Zone. She has a quest that requires 25 Candy Canes and 1 Pretzel. The reward is the Santa Outfit, Santa Skirt and 1 Espresso.
Equipment shops sell the Santa Hat and the Holly Hairpin for 300 coins each.
An NPC named Santa appears in the slime cat screen of the Frozen Valley. He gives the party 10 Candy Canes, 2 Espresso and 1 Star Fragment.
Drop Rate
- Small box - 5%
- Medium box - 20%
- Big box - 50% x2
In Previous Games
In Epic Battle Fantasy 4, if your computer clock is set to December, Big Snow Slimes will appear adorned in Christmas decorations, and Christmas-themed gear becomes available at the Equipment Shop; the Santa Hats and the Santa Outfits. In EBF3, there are three unused Giant Slime bodies representing Easter, Halloween and Christmas. The seasonal decorations are identical on all Slimes; the only difference is the color of the Slime itself. The Easter version of Giant Blue Slime and the Halloween version of Giant Green Slime stand out due to unique body colors: the former is white instead of the Slime's normal blue/cyan color, and the latter is orange instead of green. In EBF4, these Easter and Halloween bodies are still present, but only one is used — a distorted version of the pumpkin Slime appears as one of The Glitch's idle sprites. The Christmas Slime's decorations were slightly altered and used for the Big Snow Slime's December version.
Giant Easter Blue Slime body (EBF3)
Giant Halloween Green Slime body (EBF3)
Giant Christmas Red Slime body (EBF4)
Big Christmas Snow Slime body (EBF4, for comparison)
Trivia
- Valentine's Day and Chinese New Year are the only holidays to overlap. The Valentine's Day festival actually takes place entirely during the Chinese New Year festival.
- Among Festivals in EBF5, the Valentine's Day Festival is the shortest (14 days) and the Easter Festival is the longest (48), the latter possibly extended to include those who observe Lent or other Easter-related events.
- The names of the festival NPCs and items are related in some way to the festivals:
- Jin is the Pinyin for the Chinese character 金, which means gold or money, which links to the prosperity theme of Chinese New Year
- The price for the Lucky Fish flair (888 coins) is a lucky number, meaning "triple fortune" in Chinese numerology
- Amy is from the French name Aimée, which in turn derives from the Latin amor, meaning love. Valentine's Day is the festival of love.
- Bunni refers to the Easter Bunny.
- Jack refers to the Jack-o'-lantern, the carved pumpkin lantern that is a characteristic item of Halloween.
- Necron comes from nekros, Greek for dead body. This links to the death/horror theme of Halloween.
- Sally may be a nod to The Nightmare Before Christmas, a 1993 film of Tim Burton (even if the film is more linked to Halloween than Christmas).
- Santa is Santa Claus himself.