I am not a scholar on Japanese submarines, or the naval war in the Pacific to any great extent, but just wanted to chime in on a few thoughts which may or may not be 100% accurate.
American submarines pounded Japanese shipping. I mean, more than half of Japanese merchant shipping (over five million tons) was sunk by American submarines, right?
But Japanese submarines were not primarily used against shipping, but against warships, or later to transport supplies. Neither of those sounds like a very fun mission to undertake.
Most importantly, however, didn't the Japanese view service in submarines to be without much honor, thus the sub service was filled up with more than its share of the worst sailors in the IJN? Compared to the USN in which service in submarines is almost considered elite.
So I would think Japanese submarines would be much of a hit, maybe not even in Japan. I don't know how much is left of the old cultural concepts now among the Japanese "video game" crowd, but I would think sneaking around in a submarine just wouldn't appeal to the average Japanese person.
Feel free to debunk anything I've said above, as I am not 100% of any of it.
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