You're right, and the cause was simple: we only ever drew one plate. The original client draws two — the NPC's name, and a second plate directly underneath it holding their role, taken straight from the game's own text data. We built the name plate and never built the second one. The role text was already loaded and in use (it's what tells the game which NPCs are storage keepers), it just never made it onto the screen. It does now.

I counted it: 513 of the NPCs actually standing in our maps have a role in the data, so that's how many gain a second line. Signs, posters, Maple TVs and the ranking board still get no plate at all, which is correct — the game flags those as scenery, and I added a test that will fail if one of them ever sprouts a title.

I also found our NPC names were drawn in white where the original draws them yellow, matching your screenshot. That's fixed at the same time. Player name tags stay white, which is correct — the original uses white for characters and yellow for NPCs.

One correction on your example. In the version we're porting, Francois's role is "Item Creator", not "Tailor". I checked the original game files plus two later versions and every one says Item Creator; the word "Tailor" doesn't appear against any NPC at all in our version. So Francois gets his second plate, it just reads Item Creator.

To re-test: Ellinia, find Francois by the sewing machine — two yellow plates, name on top, role below. Any town's storage keeper should read "Storage Keeper". Then walk past the Henesys wanted posters and Maple TV and the Floating Market ranking board: those must still show nothing at all.