Initially proposed as a standard RPG, it was re-imagined as an MMO, reflecting Level-5 CEO Akihiro Hino's interest in online games.

It was planned to be set in a large fantasy world, where users could choose a character from one of five races and almost thirty unique classes, including many non-combat roles.

The cause was speculated by Hino to be the Xbox platform's failure to gain a large Japanese userbase, given that True Fantasy Live Online was to be a Japan-centric game.

Akihiro Hino, the CEO of Level-5, expressed the belief that while MMOs were fun for the first 20 or 30 hours, he became distressed when he realized that he was on a "level treadmill" of equipment, items, enemies and player characters advancing at the same rate.

[1] The game's environments were varied, and would have allowed for traversal using different types of mounts - horses, camels, and horned, raptor-like draconic creatures resembling chocobos were prominently depicted in screenshots.

Relations between the two companies began to spiral out of control as Level-5 struggled to meet the demands required by Microsoft, who in turn grew frustrated at the lack of progress being made on the game.

[5] In an E3 2003 preview, Hilary Goldstein of IGN wrote that character creation was "relatively painless", and praised the fact that players could not run out of things to enjoy even if they simply remained in town and never went out adventuring.

Remarking that every item had value, and players could set up their own street market anywhere, she also called the battles "smooth" and "fairly easy to perform", noting that the combat system was more fun than EverQuest.

[2] Koji Aizawa of GMR visited Level-5 offices to see the game, calling it "incredibly beautiful", with a "detailed" and "immense" world.