During the late 90s and early 2000s, Sega had some online games released on their Dreamcast console such as Alien Front Online and Phantasy Star Online. While PSO is still going strong as a franchise, many don’t know that Sega were once developing another online RPG called Farnation.
Farnation was first announced in August 2000 for the Dreamcast after it was mentioned in a document released by Sega Enterprises discussing the company’s overall business strategy. Capitalizing on the popularity of PC MMOS such as Everquest and Ultima Online, Farnation would have been a combination of MMORPG with some elements of Sim City. Players would have had the ability to cooperate with other human players in building towns including airships, banks, casinos, hospitals, and stagecoaches.
All of this information is thanks to a preview published by GameSpot who are believed to have been the only outlet to have gotten to play the game. Despite this, there is still no videos or images released to the public. However, it was discovered years later that there was a prototype of the game sitting at the Sega of America offices after a photo surfaced in Flicker.
So why was the game cancelled? While nobody knows for sure, it’s believed that it was due to Sega being in huge financial trouble after the Dreamcast was discontinued and bombed everywhere outside of Japan. This has some validity since Farnation was mentioned in a February 2001 issue of Dreamcast Magazine Issue 19 and the Dreamcast was discontinued in March 2001. It was implied that the game did continue development for the original Xbox, but no information has unveiled afterwards.
