Kawazu has drawn much of his design inspiration from Western role-playing titles such as Dungeons & Dragons and Wizardry, admitting a liking for sword and sorcery settings in his scenarios.

[1] Talking about his early life in Oguni, Kawazu said that he was a "rowdy" type who wanted to be in the limelight and did not hesitate to voice his opinion to adults.

[4][5] He was originally scheduled to enter a job with Sony from the Science School, but due to unspecified circumstances in his private life he was forced to drop out.

[3] His first game-related job was as a part-time journalist for Beep, a general gaming magazine published by SoftBank, at the invitation of a school friend.

[7] While he had never heard of the company Square, he became interested in working for them upon seeing an advertisement for Suishō no Dragon, featuring artwork by the game's illustrator Gen Sato.

[9][17] From 2004 to 2007, Kawazu served as one of Square Enix's board of directors alongside Yoichi Wada and Yosuke Matsuda.

[29][30] Kawazu is noted in his game design for using mechanics seen as unconventional in the RPG genre, such as usage-based ability leveling, non-linear storytelling, and open worlds or similar freely-explorable environments.

[6][10] Speaking specifically about the SaGa series, Kawazu described his philosophy for it as always trying something new with each entry and pushing at the perceived limitations of RPGs.

[31] His games are also noted for obscured mechanics and higher-than-average difficulty, something Kawazu ascribes to his love of challenging gameplay.

[9] Its divisive reception caused Kawazu to create more conventional titles in the future, though they continued to use his gameplay philosophies.

[2] For the visual and narrative style of his games, he drew influence from the sword and sorcery subgenre of fantasy, which he greatly enjoyed in his youth.