In the most recent issue of Japanese publication Famitsu, Microsoft announced the development of True Fantasy Online, a Massively Multiplayer Online RPG set to hit the Xbox in 2003.

Very few details are currently available, but we do know that Level 5, the developer of the popular Dark Cloud series for PS2, will be handling the title. Furthermore, the game's character designs are apparently very similar to those of Sega's Phantasy Star Online, and there will be several character classes for the player to choose from; currently, a knight and a princess have been revealed.

That's all we can bring you for now, but we should have more information regarding True Fantasy shortly. Microsoft is expected to publicly unvel the title at this year's Tokyo Game Show, which takes place from September 20th to the 22nd.

Update: Thanks to scans of the article brought to us courtesy of Wario64, we can also provide a few more of True Fantasy's gameplay nuances.

First of all, Level 5 will be implementing a very detailed, distinctive character creation system. Through this, classes for each persona will be selected and superficial details applied.

Also, the world will be navigable by several different means; a few examples given in text includes camels, dragons, and other types of animals.

And much like Phantasy Star Online, chatting will take place in the form of bubbles above each respective player's head.

As Level 5 is the developer for this piece of software, a company well-known for its Dark Cloud games, you can expect the game to take full-advantage of the Xbox's built-in hard drive. Dark Cloud and its sequel, Dark Chronicle, both feature gameplay systems that warp time and landscape, sometimes on the fly. While True Fantasy won't use the same concept, it's definitely possible to imagine more than a few neat ideas that the developer could implement.