Kenichi Matsuzaki, born October 15, 1950 in Tokyo, is a Japanese animation screenwriter and original creator known primarily for his foundational work on landmark science fiction mecha series. His professional career began not in writing but as an illustrator and designer, where he contributed to the early planning stages of Space Battleship Yamato, including designing an asteroid ship that served as a precursor to the Yamato itself. He transitioned to screenwriting with the series Muteki Kōjin Daitarn 3.

Matsuzaki is most widely recognized for his significant behind-the-scenes contributions to the real robot genre. As a young scriptwriter on Mobile Suit Gundam (1979), he wrote twelve episodes. More importantly, he was responsible for creating many of the series' core science fiction concepts, including the space colonies, the Minovsky particle, and the solar system. These fictional elements established the hard science fiction aesthetic that defined the Universal Century timeline and became a template for subsequent mecha anime. He continued this role on Space Runaway Ideon, where he wrote eight episodes and devised the settings for the ancient civilization and the mysterious Ide.

Matsuzaki served as the series composer and primary scriptwriter for The Super Dimension Fortress Macross (1982), writing thirteen episodes. In this capacity, he helped develop the series' unique world, contributing concepts such as the Zentradi alien race, Protoculture, and the pinpoint barrier system. He also held the position of series composer on its follow-up, The Super Dimension Century Orguss. His role as an original concept creator extends to the OVA Macross II: Lovers Again, where he is credited for the original story and series creation.

Beyond these major franchises, Matsuzaki is the original creator, scriptwriter, and a producer of the 1987 horror science fiction OVA Hell Target. The story follows a spaceship crew that lands on the forbidden planet Inferno II and is picked off one by one by a monstrous entity. This work represents a distinct foray into the horror genre within his filmography. His other extensive scriptwriting credits include episodes for Armored War Dragona, Bubblegum Crisis, Z.O.E Dolores, i, and Godzilla comic anthologies.

Within the anime industry, Matsuzaki is acknowledged as a brilliant conceptualist whose strength lay in constructing detailed, believable science fiction worlds and mechanical settings rather than in dramatic character writing. He was a member of the influential creative group Studio Nue, eventually serving as its second president. He also co-authored the influential publication Gundam Century, a mook that expanded the science fiction framework of Mobile Suit Gundam and helped establish the practice of deep external setting analysis for anime franchises. His scripts were also noted for a high frequency of bath scenes, earning him a humorous nickname among fans. His work on the foundational settings of Gundam and Macross solidified his status as a pivotal, if often unheralded, architect of the modern mecha genre.