Music for the game was provided by series veteran Noriyuki Iwadare, and features the opening theme song "In the Sky" performed by Japanese pop/rock artist Miz.

The player controls Yuki and his companions through a fully 3D world, fighting their way through obstacles using a battle system in the same style as the other Grandia games, with some slight tweaks.

Rather than walking across a world map to travel between areas in this game, the player flies a plane, with further landing points becoming available as the story is progressed.

The game centers on Yuki, a 16-year-old boy who dreams of becoming an ace pilot like his idol, the legendary Sky Captain Schmidt.

Together with his friend Rotts, he builds his own magic-powered aircraft in an attempt to fly over the ocean, but becomes sidetracked due to the intervention of his mother, Miranda.

When Yuki and Miranda meet Alfina, a beautiful young girl with the ability to communicate with Sacred Beasts, the god-like guardians of the planet, they become involved in an adventure.

During their journey, the party meets four other characters who become playable at certain points in the story: Alonso, a sailor who dreams of completing his map of the world; Ulf, a carefree demi-human boy who travels on a flying dragon; Dahna, a cynical cartomancer with a hidden soft side; and Hect, a sullen musician from a troubled village.

In order to combat their adversaries, the heroes must travel across the world to meet the Sacred Beasts, who consist of Gryph the eagle, Drak the dragon, Yoat the ram, Seiba the unicorn, and Unama the dolphin.

Grandia III takes place in an unnamed world, consisting of a main continent surrounded by the Belion Sea.

The girl introduces herself as Alfina, and says her must go to the temple at Arcriff to fulfill her role as a Communicator in the stead of her vanished brother, Emelious.

Though Miranda and Yuki are furious at Alonso for his deception, they agree to help him counter Bianca's cheating in order to get Alfina's brooch back.

Alfina consents to a stopover in Randoto to find a Lem Fruit, so that Yuki can meet his idol and perhaps get him to build a plane for their journey.

[1] The project was headed by director Hidenobu Takahashi, who previously served as art director for Grandia II, and stated that the game would follow the series' themes of "adventure, drama and dreams", and would continue in the direction of taking the series to a more "adult" sensibility while still retaining an overall optimistic tone.

[1] Character design for the game was provided by You Yoshinari with Takahiro Hasebe serving as scenario writer, both of whom had worked on the original Grandia.

[5] The English version of Grandia III was announced in December 2005 in the form of a teaser website from Square Enix, which revealed that the game was scheduled for release in North America the following February.

[12] The voice clips during battle and story scenes were provided by veteran anime and video game actors.

The characters all fall into conveniently familiar categories and fail to attract any serious interest in their concerns or circumstances"[19] GameSpot found the game's short length and lack of sidequests to be its low points, yet ultimately declared that "While not as stuffed with features and extra content as some of the other RPGs currently available, Grandia III still delivers an interesting (if traditional) story, fun characters, and a versatile, strategy-based battle system.

"[16] Play conversely felt that the game was above-average, stating that "[Grandia III] does almost everything well, from the involving story and beautiful graphics to the compelling characters, and does one thing - the battle system - better than any other RPG we've seen.