Lead designer Dan Greenawalt and his team looked to the Gran Turismo series, and also played Animal Crossing and Diablo II for inspiration. They also hired a former designer from the Pokémon series to work on the game. Greenawalt explained that they wanted to make a "car-collecting game" and tried to implement the best elements from the aforementioned games and franchises that they considered to be "especially good at delivering superb collecting and ongoing social experiences".