Who is Ryo Mizuno?
The dungeon master who became the novelist: Lodoss is one man’s campaign, written up twice.
Ryo Mizuno (a pen name; he was born in Osaka in 1963 and raised in Uji, Kyoto) built the world of Forcelia as a setting for games with the university circle that grew, at its peak, to around a hundred players. In 1986 he was a founding figure of Group SNE alongside Hitoshi Yasuda, and began serializing his campaign as a replay in Comptiq.
What makes Lodoss unusual among franchises is how little of it changed hands. The game master who ran the sessions is the novelist who adapted them: Mizuno wrote the seven-volume novel series (1988 to 1993), the prequel Legend of Lodoss, the sequel Next Generation, and, after a long quiet, returned in 2019 with The Crown of the Covenant, the first new Lodoss novel in twelve years.
THE WORK
One author, four seriesRecord of Lodoss War · 1988–1993
Seven novels and two side-story collections, adapted from his own three campaigns. The Grey Witch alone sold over 100,000 copies in Japan; its sequel sold better.
Legend of Lodoss · 1994–2002
The prequel series, novelized from Legend of Lodoss replays drafted by Mizuno and played by others at Group SNE, illustrated by Akihiro Yamada.
Next Generation · 1998–2006
The sequel series, following Spark, the hero of the third campaign, into knighthood. Illustrated in its first editions in part by Haruhiko Mikimoto.
THE DOUBLE LIFE
GM and authorWhat the novels changed
Mizuno smoothed the campaign logs into fiction, most famously making Deedlit’s love for Parn a thread of the novels rather than of the table, where the elf had been another player’s character.
Group SNE
The company Mizuno co-founded still publishes games and books today, and created Sword World RPG, for decades Japan’s best-selling role-playing game.
Supervisor of the world
Mizuno remains the credited supervisor of new Lodoss works, including the 2021 game Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth, whose story leads into his Crown of the Covenant.