"Viro kaj virino ludas."
Translation:A man and a woman play.
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Well, if articles don't exist in Esperanto - then how can you enforce their usage in the translations? "man and woman play" is pretty much the actual literal translation - isn't it?
No, in Esperanto lack of an article makes a noun singular. In English lack of an article makes a noun a collective personification.
When we say "man has come a long way", we don't mean one singular man. We mean mankind or humanity or some other general statement about men in general.
We have to translate singular to singular. Viro = A man
Either of them: "Viro kaj virino ludas muzikal instrumenton" aŭ "Viro kaj virino ludas tabulludon"
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If no context is given, then allow a literal translation for English can be a subtle (perfidious) language.
I was going to point out that the the choice among "a", "one", "some", "the", or even "man and woman" without modifiers all depends on the surrounding context. English - she is a harsh mistress.
"The man and woman are playing." was also marked wrong, yet it's a correct translation. I could see where you'd want "a man...", but if you're going to say that a definite article is wrong, then you must accept "Some man and some woman" or "Some man and woman".