Level-5 has issued a statement addressing the use of generative AI in some of the promotional videos shown during its “Vision 2026 II Dream” presentation. The company said it would upload revised versions of those videos, and it drew a line between errors that came from AI and errors that were simply human mistakes.
The publisher also apologized outright and stated that it does not directly use AI during the actual production of its video games.
What the company said
Level-5 singled out an image concept illustration for Yo-kai Watch 2: Hunted Domain that viewers suspected had been generated with AI. The company’s response was that not everything flagged as AI actually was.
“We have identified several instances of what was attributed to AI but were actually deliberate removal [of elements] or human error,” Level-5 wrote.
The apology was direct about the cause. “We offer our deepest apologies for causing suspicions in our production process due to our inexperience with generative AI and simple human errors,” the company said.
Level-5 also committed to limits going forward: AI would be used only for “efficiency purposes,” and it would avoid the technology in any video content presented directly to users.
The Yo-kai Watch illustration, explained
The company published the original and edited versions of the Yo-kai Watch 2: Hunted Domain illustration to walk through the confusion. Electrical poles in the background were a focal point. Level-5 said an in-company designer drew the intentionally simplified poles by hand, based on reference photos that designer had taken personally, and that no AI was used in the illustration process.
It then addressed the other details viewers had questioned — the vending machines, rain gutters and the missing brake levers on the bicycle. Level-5 said all three were drawn by hand. The simplified details in the vending machines and rain gutters were human errors, it acknowledged, and it noted that the original Yo-kai Watch 2 games on the Nintendo 3DS also did not depict bicycles with brake levers.
The chain of events
Level-5’s statement followed an earlier apology from CEO Akihiko Hino over the use of generative AI in the Vision 2026 II Dream presentation. Hino framed it as an experiment that went too far: “We incorporated cutting-edge AI that also served as an experiment, in our earnest desire to make a phenomenal presentation,” he said. “We understand this may have offended some, and we sincerely apologize.”
The presentation itself ran nearly an hour and covered a large slate, including Yo-kai Watch 2: Haunted Domain, Pufflings: Journey Through a Fantasy World, DECAPOLICE, Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time, Snack World: The Dungeon Crawl – Gold, HOLY HORROR MANSION, Inazuma Eleven: Cross, Inazuma Eleven Rekka no Kakumei and Professor Layton and the Curious Village, along with a making-of video and a preview of the company’s Tokyo Game Show 2026 booth.
Why it matters
AI disclosure has become one of the fastest ways for a studio or publisher to lose goodwill, and the response pattern here — a public apology, a technical explanation, and a stated policy — is becoming the template. What makes this case interesting is the split the company describes: some of what looked machine-made was actually a human designer simplifying background elements by hand.
That cuts both ways. It is a fair correction for viewers who assumed the worst, but it also shows how quickly audiences now default to suspecting AI, and how much explanation is required to undo that assumption. For a company with franchises as recognizable as Yo-kai Watch, Inazuma Eleven and Professor Layton, the stakes are higher than for a smaller studio.
Level-5’s commitment to keep AI out of content shown directly to users is the part worth watching. If that holds, this becomes a case where audience pressure produced a clear policy rather than a one-off apology.
For more on the season’s anime slate, our Fall 2026 anime ranking tracks what is airing now.
Source: Anime News Network
Featured image: Yo-kai Watch 2: Hunted Domain concept illustration shown by Level-5, via Anime News Network.
