Legend of Mortal Japanese Mod Adds Furigana in v2.3 Update
By adding furigana to a text-heavy wuxia RPG, the mod lowers the reading barrier for Japanese players unfamiliar with Chinese literary and martial arts terminology, potentially converting a niche cult hit into a mainstream success in Japan.
Key Facts
- Version 2.3 of the Legend of Mortal Japanese mod was released on July 19, 2026.
- The update adds furigana readings to difficult kanji, toggleable with the F7 key.
- The mod is produced by the Legend of Mortal Japanese Localization Team, a fan group with no native Japanese speakers.
- The game Legend of Mortal, developed by Obb Studio, launched on Steam in June 2024 without official Japanese support.
- A major official game update adding new story routes is scheduled for September 15, 2026.
Reporting from 2 sources: Automaton, Game Spark.
The Legend of Mortal Japanese Localization Team released version 2.3 of its fan-made Japanese mod for the Taiwanese RPG Legend of Mortal on July 19, 2026. The update adds furigana readings to difficult kanji throughout the game, including wuxia terms and character names that are hard to read from their Chinese characters alone. Players can toggle furigana display with the F7 key, choosing between full display, first-occurrence only, or off. The mod team stated that not all text currently has furigana and plans to expand coverage in future patches. Some alignment issues may occur and will be adjusted. The game, developed by Obb Studio, was originally released on Steam in June 2024 without official Japanese support. The Japanese mod first appeared in December 2025 and gained traction after a major v2.0 update on July 3, 2026, which improved translations and fonts. That update helped push concurrent Steam players past 4,000. A larger official update adding new story routes is scheduled for September 15, 2026. The mod team, which includes no native Japanese speakers according to an earlier interview, continues to refine the translation at a rapid pace.
The furigana implementation in v2.3 is toggleable: pressing F7 cycles between full furigana display, furigana only on first occurrence of a kanji, and no furigana at all. Speaker names, aliases, and dialogue choices show their readings when the cursor hovers over them. For example, the protagonist's name Zhao Huo displays as "Chōkatsu" on hover. The mod team also added a playful touch: the pet crane Huo Shandian, a reference to the Chinese translation of the Firebolt broom from Harry Potter, now carries the furigana "Faiaboruto" (Firebolt). The team has been iterating rapidly since v2.0 on July 3, releasing v2.1 and v2.2 the following days to fix translation errors and font bugs. The game still contains a vast amount of text, and the mod team acknowledges that furigana coverage is incomplete. A major official game update on September 15 will add new heroine routes and story branches, which the mod will need to translate as well.
Synthesized by Yomimono from the 2 cited sources below, including Japanese-language reporting where cited, then editorially reviewed before publishing.