Chapter 8 postscript

Ryo Mizuno (1963｜), Japanese novelist and game designer.Born in Osaka Prefecture, graduated from the Faculty of Law of Ritsumeikan University.I have been interested in RPG (role-playing game) since college. In 1987, I joined the game production company SNE team (SNE) headed by Yasuda and began to serialize the TRPG (tabletop role-playing game) created by myself in the magazine in the same year. ) play experience "Rodes Island War". "The War of Rhodes Island" was a rare fantasy literature and light novel in Japan at that time. It brought the charm of RPG to the Japanese where RPG began to prevail, and sold 10 million copies.His novels include "The War of Rhodes Island" and "Magic Warrior Levi" (Magic Warrior ) and so on.

"Record of Lodoss War" (岛, Record of Lodoss War) trilogy is "Record of Lodoss War", "Legend of Rhodes Island" and "New Record of Lodoss War".Works have been adapted into animations, comics, games, CDs, art books, etc.The first "War of Rhodes Island" has seven episodes, from 1988 to 1995, and there are two other volumes.The illustrator is Izuyu Yu.The first episode "The Gray Witch" (Gray  Witch) tells a world of swords and magic. In this world, there is an isolated island called Rhodes Island, which has little communication with the mainland, called the cursed island.The peace of the island in just thirty years was destroyed by new wars and conspiracies. The knight's son Pain () with a strong sense of justice embarked on a journey with his companions in the small northern village.

Ahh, this is "Rodos Island War".It not only has the spirit of traditional fantasy epics, but also has many elements and charms of the RPG world, which is good-looking. Perhaps it is a reappearance of the running group that was originally a TRPG. This book is very story-centered, rather than the character-centered of ordinary light novels, and the story is experienced through the eyes of the characters.To put it simply, this book is like a history narrating the situation of Rhodes Island. Although the characters in it are still charming, their thoughts, action motives, feelings, struggles, etc. are not the focus, so just taste it.This reduces the interest of describing the character and making the reader feel the role, making the character a bit formulaic and unresonable, unable to feel the character's mood.

Despite this, The Gray Witch's story and concise narrative style are still fascinating.The huge but not annoying world view, the historical and legendary background with a strong taste of classical legends, exciting multiple battles, and the adventures of the protagonist and his party are all attractive.Among them, I like the gray witch's ups and downs of Rhodes Island, the open momentum of the heroes and braves manipulating the palms, and the cooperation and means of the protagonist and his party to solve the obstacles encountered. In addition to the above-mentioned sense of substitution and character description that may not be so good, the author's description of the battle war also leaves readers with more to say.The battles, wars, and conspiracies in the book are very detailed and organized, but not complicated and difficult to understand; the battles are also as compact and exciting as you can remember, but at the critical moment and the most tense (nervous) moment, you feel that the momentum cannot be raised, and you feel lost. something like that.For example, Faen () and Beirut (), the second of the Six Heroes, will face off against the Gray Witch Kara ().It's over, a little more, and other thoughts have been lingering in my mind after reading the book.

Overall it's pretty good.The first 300 pages is a complete and magnificent poem.The break-up and separation that rarely appeared so early in the general light novel system unexpectedly ended the first episode.I really want to see the follow-up of the story of Pan and others and Rhodes Island! 【one】 Rhodes Island is exactly the bridge set in the Japanese fantasy world, and it may be the opportunity for me to start reading fantasy literature.The biggest problem with Japanese fantasy literature is that it is too gamified, and even more aggressively uses words such as level and hp. Magic and martial arts are also exaggerated. On the other hand, Rhodes Island is more like Western fantasy literature, with a little bit of the East. Color adventure martial arts elements.

Another interesting thing about Rhodes Island is that each country has its own different system, and there is no so-called all good and all evil (meaning gray).Parn & Dido traveled around the world, assembled different partners to fight, separated after the end, and met again at a certain time and place, each time it had a good effect. Today, it seems that Pahn's early days are indeed very formulaic, and he is always like a fledgling protagonist, but after growing up, he is still very interesting.What's more, there will be another protagonist, Spike, in the later period! 【two】 "The War of Rhodes Island" is different from other Japanese fantasy and RPG-like novels that I have read, and is more traditional.However, in those years, the combination of fantasy and RPG games was still a major innovation in Japan.

There is no all good and all evil, good is temporarily uncertain, but it is true that there is no absolute evil in the book.There is no character that people can clearly point out that he is a villain. Everyone just has different positions and different attachments.This is not bad for now, I don't know if there will be more extensions. The different combinations and encounters make me want to watch the sequel even more XD. 【three】 I feel that the last team didn’t have much communication, it’s a bit like traveling with a group of people I don’t know. The other book "Dragon Race" does a better job in this regard. I sincerely recommend it, and many places are also excellent.

Time flies a bit fast in the plot, a month has passed in a blink of an eye, the protagonist grows up too fast, and becomes stronger without going through anything (referring to not describing it carefully).And I also overlooked a little bit of fighting. I am still looking forward to the adventure when I find the six heroes! The description of the battle is a bit too simple. I don't know if it's because of the relationship with the ancestor, it's a bit old, and I can guess a lot of the plot.Maybe it was very innovative at that time, but maybe many of the following novels were plagiarized, which seems a bit formulaic.Fortunately, the author's writing style is very good, not boring and clichéd.