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Reki Kawahara - Sword Art Online

Kawahara Reki (川原礫) (male), also known as Kunori Fumio (九里史生), is a Japanese novelist born on August 17, 1974, and is the main writer and supervisor of the Sword Art Online franchise and more. His official website states: "WordGear: An experimental world generated by Fumio Kunori, since 2002."

Biography

Early life

He was born in 1974 in Gunma Prefecture. He has two younger sisters. He participated in the manga study club at university, where he drew manga and illustrations, and often played fighting games with club members in the game room.
In 1998, he started playing Ultima Online , which would be the first of many online games in his future. He also played Ragnarok Online , and Reki mentioned at various points that the game he played the most was either that or World of Warcraft . He also played Phantasy Star Online. He tried drawing manga, but found it too tedious a process to get his ideas down on paper, and he preferred making up stories to the work that went into them, so he started writing novels.

Creations as a writer

In 2001, Reki applied for the 9th Dengeki Game Novel Grand Prize (currently known as the Dengeki Novel Prize ). He had only read other works before writing Sword Art Online (SAO) , so this was his first book. He completed it in 2002, but due to Dengeki Bunko's page count limitations, he was rejected and forfeited the prize, unwilling and not being skilled enough to cut the storyline.

Reki, who loved his work so much, published it on his website under the pseudonym "Kunori Fumio." The online novel was acclaimed by his readers, which motivated Reki to write more.

In 2008, Reki was inspired by works he had read at Media Works Inc., such as The Shadow of Tokyo and Those Who Hunt Elves. He re-entered the Dengeki Light Novel Award with Kyōzetsu Kasoku Burst Linker. Once again, his work proved too long, but this time he managed to shorten it. He won the magazine's First Prize, becoming a professional writer at the age of 34.

Reki changed the title to Accel World based on reader feedback. The concept came from fighting games. Reki thought it would be fun if people could just get lost in space in the middle of a street and turn the world into a fighting game at will. However, feeling that getting lost in space would be truly dangerous, he added the brain-exploding setting.

Right after publication, his editor Miki Kazuma read the SAO webnovel and I decided to novelize that as well.

Reki's inspiration for the second volume of SAO He had played many online games but had never been part of a high-level group and he envied the equipment and reputation of those players. He wrote it from the perspective of an intermediate player who admired the top groups in the same way.

For the third volume of SAO , Reki thought of the idea that two people could FullDive from the same house without realizing the other was doing so. Thus, the Fairy Dance Arc was written.

Reki mentioned that he particularly enjoyed writing the explanation scenes, but Kazuma told him they were too long.

Bibliography

(As of February 2020.)

Accel World Volumes 1 to 24
Sword Art Online Volumes 1 to 23
Sword Art Online Progressive Volumes 1 to 6
Physical Edition Volumes 1 to 29
The Insulator Volumes 1 to 3
Alternative to Sword Art Online: Gun Gale Online Volumes 1 to 9 (framed)
Alternative to Sword Art Online: Clover's Regret Volumes 1 to 3
Sword Art Online Material Edition Parts 1-29

Sword Art Online Side Stories

There is only one ultimate way
Caliber SS (SS Series) kyaribā sukoshi shippai han None
Against (Seriously) basasu None
Breaking the Damage Limit (The Book of Friendship is a Book) damēji no genkai toppa None
Pencil board for stories
Celestial Fairy (The Secret of Success) Cheresute no Yosei (I don't know what it is) None
16.8.5
Lisbeth Edition
- Sound of Water, Sound of Hammer (TV Series, TV Series) mizuoto, tsuchioto None
- Extraordinary and Ordinary Days (非日常という日常hinichijō to iu nichijō None
Silica Edition
- A Ray of Sunshine in Winter (There's Something Wrong with That) Fuyu no Hidamari None
- The final promise (The word “series”) saigo no yakusoku None
Pina Edition
- The Fourteenth Autumn (十四回目の秋juyonkaime no aki None
- Bonus Manga Theater Edition Pina (ピナ・エディ・おまけ・まんが劇場Pina edi omake manga gekijō None
The day before (ザ・デイ・ビフォアof the bifoa None
The Day After Tomorrow ( from afutā None
Rainbow Bridge (The word is written Niji without hashi None
Sweet Days (シュガーリィ・デイズshugārī deizu None
Prayer of the Sisters
Cordial Accords (コーディアル・コードkōdiaru kōdo None
Far Journey (ディスタント・ジャーニーdisutanto jānī None
"If you were here"

Filmography

(film) Accel World: Infinite Blast (2016) (screenplay)
(film) Sword Art Online the Movie: Ordinal Scale (2017) (story)
(anime) Alternative to Sword Art Online: Gun Gale Online (2018) (thesis supervision)

Anecdotes

Reki can't concentrate on working at home, so he writes for family restaurants, even going so far as to claim that if they were to decline, he would retire.
Reki stated that Haruyuki was the character most like him among all his creations, but without the sense of justice, friends, and composure.
Haruyuki was designed to be fat in order to show the complete opposite image of acceleration, and certainly not to make him have a complex about it for the sake of the story.
Reki stated that Kirito was the ideal person he wanted to become. Reki added that he had always been hesitant about acting, noting that it took him seven years to apply for the Dengeki Prize.
On the web radio station Dengeki Bunko, Reki mentioned his favorite Sword Art Online character from the series was Leafa.
The Silver Crow avatar design was done by Reki.
Reki always ended up playing Western MMOs alone because he couldn't communicate well with American players and they would get angry.
Reki's hobby is cycling.
Reki voiced Tin Writer in Accel World Television. However, Tin Writer was re-dubbed for the Blu-ray release.
Reki tweeted for viewers by commenting to clarify certain scenes in real time as both Accel World and Sword Art Online anime were airing and responded to all messages on his website.