In the world of Japanese localization dreams of a global indie hit were swiftly derailed by the terrifying specter of bad translations. If you thought ghosts were the scariest thing in Subway Exorcist Girl, you haven’t seen what happens when AI decides to take on a language as nuanced as Japanese. Spoiler alert: the ghosts were easier to deal with.
Our lone developer, bless their hardworking soul, turned to the cutting-edge powers of AI like ChatGPT and DeepL, thinking they could outwit the labyrinth of Japanese language subtleties. The result? A trainwreck so profound, it became its own kind of horror story. And here’s the twist ending: no matter how “smart” your AI is, it will never replace a human translator when it comes to a language like Japanese.
Let’s talk about kanji. For anyone unfamiliar, kanji are the complex characters borrowed from Chinese that make Japanese look like a beautiful but incomprehensible art form. Each kanji has multiple meanings depending on context, and if you choose the wrong one, the consequences can range from mildly confusing to utterly absurd. Take, for example, a moment when the AI wanted to say, “Step into the haunted train car and confront the spirit.” Sounds spooky, right? Except the kanji chosen translated it more like, “Board the vehicle and deal with the ghostly cart.” Nothing says “immersive horror” like imagining the player chasing down a possessed shopping cart.
Then there’s the issue of politeness levels, which AI seems to approach with all the subtlety of a jackhammer. Japanese is a language where how you say something can matter as much as what you’re saying. You have casual speech for your friends, polite speech for strangers, and honorific speech for, well, the emperor. But AI? AI doesn’t understand this delicate balance. Instead, it slapped polite endings like “です” and “ます” onto everything, resulting in dialogue that feels like a very formal weather report. Imagine a teenage exorcist politely saying, “Excuse me, sir ghost, but I humbly request you depart this train immediately. Thank you ever so much.” It’s hard to be scared when you’re laughing at your own character sounding like they’re apologizing for bothering the spirits.
And the mistakes weren’t limited to word choices or tone. Entire sentences were just… wrong. One Japanese player shared their feedback, kindly suggesting that the developer take a look at kanji usage with a link to a guide, subtly hinting, “Hey, maybe this could help you not butcher our language.” Another player mentioned that the characters’ personalities weren’t coming through in their dialogue. This is a big deal, because in Japanese, the way someone speaks—the words they choose, their level of politeness, even how they use regional slang—communicates a lot about who they are. AI, though, doesn’t do “personality.” It doesn’t know that a high school girl in a horror game shouldn’t talk like she’s giving a corporate presentation at Toshiba.
The developer, to their credit, realized the scope of the disaster. They painstakingly went back and fed every single line into AI tools again—this time babysitting the process, proofreading, tweaking, and burning through their ChatGPT subscription like it was their life force. But no matter how hard they tried, the cracks showed. The tutorial, which should help players understand the game, still came across as cryptic and confusing. A player’s feedback summed it up perfectly: “The atmosphere is great, but the language is so unclear it’s hard to follow.” If that’s not an endorsement for hiring a professional translator, I don’t know what is.
And let’s not forget the cultural nuances. Japanese isn’t just about getting the grammar right—it’s about understanding the culture. You can’t throw idioms, metaphors, or ghostly threats into a blender and expect them to make sense on the other side. AI doesn’t understand that a phrase like “rest in peace” doesn’t have a direct equivalent in Japanese but might instead require something culturally appropriate like “be at peace in the afterlife.” Without that human touch, the game’s dialogue ends up feeling awkward, stilted, and, ironically, less immersive.
The irony of all this is that the developer clearly worked their heart out. They even maxed out their AI tools, to the point where one broke under the strain of re-translating every sentence. But the truth is, no amount of AI can replace what a human translator brings to the table: an understanding of context, nuance, and the emotional resonance of a story. Language is alive, messy, and full of quirks that only a real person can navigate. And while AI can be a helpful assistant, it’s not ready to take the lead.
So, what’s the lesson here? If you’re an indie developer dreaming of reaching a global audience, don’t skimp on your translations. Hire a professional who understands both the language and the culture. AI might be able to help you generate text, but only a human can give it soul. Otherwise, your haunted train ride might end up scaring people for all the wrong reasons.
Source: https://automaton-media.com/articles/newsjp/horror-subway-exorcist-girl-20250128-326683/
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