According to a 1993 World of Phantasy Star book interview with Miki Morimoto, she stated that the meaning of the game's title was like “a planet/star of fantasy” and that Yuji Naka was the one who originally named the game Phantasy Star. He started with just the word "Fantasy", and played around with it until he figured out what to name the game. He was also influenced by a song called "Nagisa no Fantasy" (Beachside Fantasy) by his favorite singer, an idol named Noriko Sakai.