Kingdom Come Deliverance Developers Fired Czech-to-English Translator and Replaced Him with AI
Warhorse Studios — the team behind Kingdom Come: Deliverance — found themselves in a messy story. A translator who says he’d been on staff for nearly 4 yrs claims he was let go with no warning and that his job was handed over to AI.
The Reddit thread where he posted drew attention: moderators there reportedly verified his creds and confirmed he’d worked at Warhorse.
Hello everyone! My name is Max G., and since July 2022 I have worked at Warhorse Studios as a Czech-to-English translator and editor. Mainly, I worked on KCD2 and its expansions, including dialogues, quest journals, item names, and much more, as well as occasionally working on marketing materials.
According to Max, the meeting felt abrupt — no lead-in, just a message that his role would become “obsolete” next month. Management’s explanation, as he recounts it, leaned on phrases like “make the company more efficient” and “save money”; the plan, they said, was to move future translations to AI. Little corporate-speak, big consequences.
This was a huge shock to me. Although discussions about using AI for translation had arisen before (I have always been categorically against it), it never got to the point where it could cost me my job in the future. Of course, the thought crossed my mind, but I naively believed that my work at WHS was valued enough that I wouldn’t be under immediate threat.
He stresses he won’t break his NDA and isn’t asking to be rehired — still, he refuses to keep silent about what happened. NDA, AI — the practical bits are blunt; the personal fallout is messier.
Warhorse Studios hadn’t issued an official comment by the time this was written. The post has nonetheless resonated: the community is rallying behind the dismissed translator, criticizing the swap of a live specialist for an algorithm, especially given KCD’s reputation for tight localization and attention to nuance.