First Comics News: How did you make your comic book debut?
Ryan O’Sullivan: Back in early 2016, I kickstarted a graphic novel called Turncoat with the illustrator Plaid Klaus. It was a story about a man who killed superheroes for a living, but was terrible at it. It did really well, and I was able to build a career off the back of it. Since the release of Turncoat, I’ve worked on a whole bunch of comics and graphic novels for a bazillion different publishers, including comics based on video games like Dark Souls and The Evil Within, comics with musicians like Yungblud, The Wu-Tang Clan, and Jimmy Eat World, and a bunch of creator-owned comic series. One of which, Fearscape, was one of The Guardian’s “Books of the Year” back when it was released.
It’s been a fun decade.
1st: Have you ever played the MMORPG RuneScape?
Ryan: MMORPGs are near and dear to my heart. My lifelong addiction has been NCSoft’s City of Heroes. (Including the still-running, officially-licensed, pirate server, Homecoming.) Despite spending almost 20,000 hours in Paragon City, I have travelled to other MMORPG worlds. RuneScape’s Gielinor was one of them.
The appeal of RuneScape to me as a teen was always the insanely deep lore. It’s been going so long with active development that it easily rivals big universes like Warhammer 40,000 or Star Wars. For a creator playing in this space (and as a teen roleplaying on the roleplay server – a not entirely dissimilar experience), the world of Gielinor was the perfect environment to find a small corner and carve out a story. There’s so much untapped space to play in.
I also love the emergent, player-built storytelling that RuneScape always seems to generate. There was an old RuneScape player called Larryr who, back when crafting was introduced to the game, created an in-game cartel based around in-game resources. I remember thinking this was the coolest thing ever at the time. Putting Larry in the comic was a no-brainer.
1st: What is the story in “RuneScape: Untold Tales of the God Wars”
Ryan: According to Amazon, it’s:
“The debut graphic novel explores Gielinor, the setting for the seminal medieval fantasy MMORPGs RuneScape and Old School RuneScape, expanding on the fan-favourite God Wars Dungeon quest line in a never-before-seen epic.
“Filled with vibrant characters, daring adventure, and mysterious magicks, this debut graphic novel is one you won’t want to miss!
“Delve into the Temple of Lost Ancients during the catastrophic and iconic God Wars, as four warring armies fight for control of the Godsword: the only weapon capable of killing a deity. Trapped in the centre of the conflict is the undead Maro, who dreams of breaking free of his master’s clutches. But escaping from the necromancer leads to a twisting, thrilling journey for Maro when he finds allies – and enemies – across the front lines.”
Sounds about right. Good work, Titan.
1st: What is Gielinor like?
Ryan: No idea. Never been there. Maro says it’s fun, though.
1st: Do you have a favourite character in “RuneScape: Untold Tales of the God Wars”
Ryan: Our lead, the hovering sentient skull Maro, is my favourite character. He’s very much inspired by, and a homage to, Morte from Planescape: Torment. Although there’s a goblin that shows up in the fourth chapter of the comic that I’m also pretty fond of. It was very exciting to add my own characters to the world of RuneScape.
Apparently, Maro’s been added to the game. Beyond excited at that news. Absolute boyhood dream. Not entirely sure who I need to bribe at Jagex to let me play as him, though. Hopefully,y I’ll be able to nepotize my way into getting preferential treatment.
1st: Who is the main villain in “RuneScape: Untold Tales of the God Wars”
Ryan: My editor, Phoebe. Back when I was putting together the story pitch for the series, I was also working my way through Tolstoy’s War and Peace. It’s a big old book, and one of the ideas it explores is that the Great Men of History didn’t really influence anything to the extent we think they did. War heroes didn’t really exist. And generals like Napoleon didn’t have nearly as much influence on the outcome of battles as his centuries of PR would have you believe. Because I had this rattling around in my head, I tried to portray each of the four armies fighting in the war, and the generals “leading” them, as pretty chaotic entities. No plan survives contact with the enemy, as they say.
The Zamorakeans, being literal demons, meant they pretty much fell into the typical villain antagonist role quite easily. But even in their case, their goals weren’t especially evil. They just wanted power. That’s a very human and understandable desire.
1st: What is the Godsword?
Ryan: It’s a sword that can kill gods. The four armies fighting each other in this comic want it. They want it so that they can kill the gods of the armies they oppose.
It’s a fantasy WMD, essentially.
1st: What is “A Dark Interlude” about?
Ryan: It was the last creator-owned book I wrote. It came out four years ago, which makes its title a bit prophetic, albeit by design. It was the sequel to an earlier book of mine called Fearscape. The premise is that it was in denial about being a sequel. (So much so that Henry Henry, the protagonist of Fearscape and the narrator of A Dark Interlude, refused to show up in the comic.) His belief was that sequel culture and the constant shared universification of IP means Nothing Original Gets Made Any More. I have no idea if I agree with him. But considering my favourite single-player video games are Streets of Rage 2, XCOM 2, Darkest Dungeon 2, Baldur’s Gate 2, and most recently, Silksong, I clearly don’t mind sequels as much as Henry Henry does.
1st: What has been your most challenging comic book to write?
Ryan: A Dark Interlude was hard because Henry Henry was done with me after Fearscape. So his refusal to show up in the sequel was a pretty direct reflection of how difficult it was to bring his voice back when scripting it. He even tried to flanderise himself a few times to spite me. I don’t miss him.
With that said, the graphic novel script I recently wrote for Abbey Road Studios was probably the hardest thing I’ve ever written, if only due to the endless revisions required. It was my first non-fiction graphic novel. And my scripts were going through sound engineers instead of licensors. Which meant endless tweaking. It was creatively challenging, and therefore very fun, but it was also exceptionally tough.
1st: Which comic book professionals do you most admire?
Ryan: I really enjoyed working with Sid Kotian on the RuneScape comic. He’d often combine panels. (Blasphemy! My scripts are sacred!) But it always worked.
There’s a part in the first chapter of the comic that involves an absolutely huge demon general. Sid drew all the panels with him in super close-up, creating the sense that said demon general was too big to fit into the comic. It worked really well.
The entire comic was just that sort of stuff, constantly. It was always exciting to see Sid’s pages come in.
1st: What is next in your career?
Ryan: I have something very exciting cooking for 2026 with an artist I’ve been best friends with for over 20 years. But I can’t talk about it yet. Except to say it will be taking up all of my time.
1st: Which character’s ability or powers from “RuneScape: Untold Tales of the God Wars” would you most like to have and why?
Ryan: None of them. Any ability they have, such as being able to talk to the dead, always seems to come with a cost. Either they die, or they have to live with what they did to stay alive.
1st: Any words for the fans of your work?
Ryan: If you’re not familiar with RuneScape lore, read the comic pretending you already know what all the weird fantasy words refer to.
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