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Learn Hardcore Japanese: sukoaboodo ni sukoa ga deru. - The score appears on the scoreboard.

Hardcore Japanese
/Going bowling with friends
/sukoaboodo ni sukoa ga deru.

sukoaboodo ni sukoa ga deru.

スコアボード　に　スコア　が　出でる。sukoaboodo ni sukoa ga deru.

The score appears on the scoreboard.

Breakdown of sukoaboodo ni sukoa ga deru.

subject particle

location particle

a bowling score

Questions & Answers about sukoaboodo ni sukoa ga deru.

What does 出る mean here? I thought it meant to go out or to leave.

Yes, 出る（でる） often means to go out / to come out / to leave, but it has several related uses.

In this sentence, 出る means something like:

to appear
to be shown
to come up on a screen/display

So スコアが出る means the score appears or the score is displayed.

This is a very common use of 出る for information, results, numbers, text, etc. For example:

結果が出る = the results come out
画面に文字が出る = text appears on the screen

Why is the particle が used after スコア?

が marks the thing that appears or comes out.

So in:

スコアが出る

the score is the thing doing the verb 出る in a grammatical sense. It is the thing that appears.

A natural way to think about it is:

スコアが出る = the score appears

Even though English might translate this more passively as the score is shown, Japanese does not need a passive form here. It simply says the score appears.

Why is used after ?

Nihon-shiki romanizationwatasi ha tyuugoku kara kimasita

Hepburn romanizationwatashi wa chuugoku kara kimashita

スコアボードsukoaboodo

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に

スコアボード

Here, に marks the place where something appears.

So:

スコアボードに = on the scoreboard
スコアボードにスコアが出る = the score appears on the scoreboard

This use of に is common with verbs that involve existence, appearance, or arrival in a place.

For example:

画面に名前が出る = a name appears on the screen
新聞に広告が出る = an ad appears in the newspaper

So に is not meaning motion to the scoreboard here. It marks the location of appearance.

Why isn’t it スコアを出る?

Because 出る is an intransitive verb.

That means it does not take a direct object marked by を.

So:

スコアが出る = the score appears

not

スコアを出る

If you want to say to put out / show / display the score, you would usually use the transitive counterpart 出す（だす）:

スコアを出す = to display the score / to put up the score

This is a very important pair:

出る = something comes out / appears
出す = someone puts something out / shows it

Is there any reason the sentence does not use は?

Yes. Using が here keeps the focus on what appears.

スコアが出る = the score appears

This sounds like a straightforward description of what happens.

If you used は, the nuance would change. For example:

スコアはスコアボードに出る

This sounds more like as for the score, it appears on the scoreboard, perhaps contrasting it with something else.

So が is the most natural choice when simply describing the event.

What is the basic word order of this sentence?

The sentence follows a very common Japanese pattern:

[place] に [thing] が [verb]
スコアボードにスコアが出る

Literally, this is something like:

On the scoreboard, the score appears.

Japanese often puts location before the thing and the verb at the end.

So even though English says The score appears on the scoreboard, Japanese naturally says:

On the scoreboard, the score appears

Are スコアボード and スコア just English loanwords?

Yes. Both are katakana words borrowed from English:

スコアボード = scoreboard
スコア = score

This is very common in Japanese, especially for sports, technology, fashion, and modern culture.

A learner should still remember that even when the words come from English, the grammar around them is fully Japanese:

particles like に and が
Japanese verb usage like 出る

So the vocabulary may look familiar, but the sentence structure is Japanese.

How is this sentence pronounced?

It is pronounced:

Sukoabōdo ni sukoa ga deru.

More closely broken down:

スコアボード = su-ko-a-bō-do
に = ni
スコア = su-ko-a
が = ga
出る = de-ru

Note that ボー has a long vowel sound: bō.

Does に mean on here, even though it usually means to?

Yes. Japanese particles often have a range of related uses, and に is one of the most flexible ones.

Here, に marks the location where something appears, so in English it is often translated as:

on
in
at

depending on the context.

So:

スコアボードに = on the scoreboard
画面に = on the screen
紙に = on the paper

It is better not to memorize に as only meaning to. Think of it more broadly as marking a point, target, or location.

Could this sentence also mean A score appears on the scoreboard, not necessarily the score?

Yes. Japanese does not have articles like a and the, so スコア by itself does not explicitly tell you which one in the way English does.

Depending on context, this could be understood as:

the score appears on the scoreboard
a score appears on the scoreboard

However, in most natural contexts, the score is the more likely translation, because a scoreboard normally shows the relevant score.

So the exact English article depends on context, not on the Japanese grammar itself.

Is this a complete natural sentence by itself?

Yes, it is grammatically complete and natural.

It sounds like a simple statement describing what happens:

The score appears on the scoreboard.

Depending on context, Japanese might often omit words if they are obvious, but this sentence is already perfectly fine as it is.

It could be used in contexts like:

explaining how a game display works
describing what happens after a play
giving instructions or commentary about a system or screen

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