Quests and instances do not necessarily mean it is theme park not sandbox. However I would say that pre-determined classes does. To be Sandbox you need to be allowed to develop your character as you see fit without classes. All skill trees should be open and you could create anything - an archer- mage-healer-tank if you wanted - it would probably be useless but you could go that way in a sandbox game. Themepark games also have storylines that rope the player in, whereas Sandbox games have a storyline that is more refence point to the world and a possible source of quests but not something you have to pay attention to to have success in the game. Note: this is my opinion, I am sure some will agree and some will trash me but it is my opinion.
You all have no idea what a Sandbox game is. Just because the game will have classes, levels and some instances does not mean it cant be a Sandbox. As long as the game is not forcing you down a linear path and gives you freedom to explore in an open world the way you want then its a Sandbox game.
If you go look up Sandbox game at Wikipedia it redirects you to Open World game.
An open world is a type of video game level design concept where a player can freely roam a virtual world.[1] The term is sometimes used interchangeably with "sandbox" and "free-roaming".[2][3] Terms such as open world, sandbox and free-roaming allude to the absence of artificial barriers,[4] in contrast to the invisible walls and "loading..." screens that are common in more linear level designs. As with a physical sandbox, the user is entertained by their ability to play creatively, boundless of artificial structural constraints, and with there being "no right way"[5] of playing the game. However, many open world games still enforce restrictions at some points in the game environment, either due to absolute game design limitations or temporary limitations imposed by a game's linearity.
There you have the definition of Sandbox game so please stop saying what a Sandbox game is to you.
You all have no idea what a Sandbox game is. Just because the game will have classes, levels and some instances does not mean it cant be a Sandbox. As long as the game is not forcing you down a linear path and gives you freedom to explore in an open world the way you want then its a Sandbox game.
If you go look up Sandbox game at Wikipedia it redirects you to Open World game.
An open world is a type of video game level design concept where a player can freely roam a virtual world.[1] The term is sometimes used interchangeably with "sandbox" and "free-roaming".[2][3] Terms such as open world, sandbox and free-roaming allude to the absence of artificial barriers,[4] in contrast to the invisible walls and "loading..." screens that are common in more linear level designs. As with a physical sandbox, the user is entertained by their ability to play creatively, boundless of artificial structural constraints, and with there being "no right way"[5] of playing the game. However, many open world games still enforce restrictions at some points in the game environment, either due to absolute game design limitations or temporary limitations imposed by a game's linearity.
There you have the definition of Sandbox game so please stop saying what a Sandbox game is to you.
so your opinion is that wikipedia is a reliable source, thanks for your opinion - I will go on stating mine, thanks - at least I developed it myself and did not trust the opinion of someone else who just happened to post it on wikipedia.
You all have no idea what a Sandbox game is. Just because the game will have classes, levels and some instances does not mean it cant be a Sandbox. As long as the game is not forcing you down a linear path and gives you freedom to explore in an open world the way you want then its a Sandbox game.
If you go look up Sandbox game at Wikipedia it redirects you to Open World game.
An open world is a type of video game level design concept where a player can freely roam a virtual world.[1] The term is sometimes used interchangeably with "sandbox" and "free-roaming".[2][3] Terms such as open world, sandbox and free-roaming allude to the absence of artificial barriers,[4] in contrast to the invisible walls and "loading..." screens that are common in more linear level designs. As with a physical sandbox, the user is entertained by their ability to play creatively, boundless of artificial structural constraints, and with there being "no right way"[5] of playing the game. However, many open world games still enforce restrictions at some points in the game environment, either due to absolute game design limitations or temporary limitations imposed by a game's linearity.
There you have the definition of Sandbox game so please stop saying what a Sandbox game is to you.
so your opinion is that wikipedia is a reliable source, thanks for your opinion - I will go on stating mine, thanks - at least I developed it myself and did not trust the opinion of someone else who just happened to post it on wikipedia.
You all have no idea what a Sandbox game is. Just because the game will have classes, levels and some instances does not mean it cant be a Sandbox. As long as the game is not forcing you down a linear path and gives you freedom to explore in an open world the way you want then its a Sandbox game.
If you go look up Sandbox game at Wikipedia it redirects you to Open World game.
An open world is a type of video game level design concept where a player can freely roam a virtual world.[1] The term is sometimes used interchangeably with "sandbox" and "free-roaming".[2][3] Terms such as open world, sandbox and free-roaming allude to the absence of artificial barriers,[4] in contrast to the invisible walls and "loading..." screens that are common in more linear level designs. As with a physical sandbox, the user is entertained by their ability to play creatively, boundless of artificial structural constraints, and with there being "no right way"[5] of playing the game. However, many open world games still enforce restrictions at some points in the game environment, either due to absolute game design limitations or temporary limitations imposed by a game's linearity.
There you have the definition of Sandbox game so please stop saying what a Sandbox game is to you.
so your opinion is that wikipedia is a reliable source, thanks for your opinion - I will go on stating mine, thanks - at least I developed it myself and did not trust the opinion of someone else who just happened to post it on wikipedia.
I can't see how the game is gonna be a sandbox. Just from reading the rest of the questions you can easily see they're going the theme park (not that I mind) road also channels don't make for a very good sandbox game.
How would you define a sandbox?
FFA full loot gankfest? ^^ That pretty much describes many peoples definition of it...
A: TERA will feature a combination of quests in both the open world and instances.
A: Channels and shards are different in that Channels are parallel instances within the same server, whereas shards are different servers.
A: Quests are a main part of the game
A: PVP will be on a sever-by-server basis
Sorry, I don't see what part of this game would be considered "sandbox." Maybe one of the quests involves killing 10 imps to reclaim the royal sandbox for some king.
TERA most certainly will be "themeparked". The only sandbos you will find is the PvP system. And knowing the developer's orogin, even that sandbox will be small. BHS is 95% Lineage II / III developers, and I suspect that the open world PvP will use rules of engagement as well as PK (red) status.
Wait what? "has been described as a sandbox mmo" ... lol... I really wonder if people are being taught the basics of grammar and the meaning of words and statements.... Here is how I describe Tera:
“Tera is a pink elephant.”
“Tera is responsible for global warming.”
“Tera was built by using 100% all natural soybean extract combined with lemon shavings.”
Alright... Now any one of you could make a thread/post/blog/news story saying that:
“Tera has been described as a pink elephant”
“Tera has been described as being responsible for global warming”
“Tera has been described as being built by using 100% all natural soybean extract combined with lemon shavings.”
And every single one of you would be 100% correct in saying these statements because I did in fact describe Tera as those things. But guess what every single statement that I said about Tera is untrue which means getting all excited about them is a little ridiculous.
A: TERA will feature a combination of quests in both the open world and instances.
A: Channels and shards are different in that Channels are parallel instances within the same server, whereas shards are different servers.
A: Quests are a main part of the game
A: PVP will be on a sever-by-server basis
Sorry, I don't see what part of this game would be considered "sandbox." Maybe one of the quests involves killing 10 imps to reclaim the royal sandbox for some king.
TERA most certainly will be "themeparked". The only sandbos you will find is the PvP system. And knowing the developer's orogin, even that sandbox will be small. BHS is 95% Lineage II / III developers, and I suspect that the open world PvP will use rules of engagement as well as PK (red) status.
I am going to be honest, the political sandbox of Lineage 2 is still one of the best in any MMO in my opinion, to make a really good political pvp game all they have to do is improve on the L2 model which I am sure they will considering their dev team was part of it. it needs more political tools and more meaningful stuff to do with cities and towns even if they are static, the territory control in L2 and the political factions it creates is absolutely amazing and I am hoping that a game either TERA or something else can recreate that and improve on some archaic mechanics of L2 main these:
- Static elements in the city, cities in L2 are very detailed but they dont have much functionality, there needs to be more stuff to do , empty buildings need to be occupied etc.. not just geometry around NPCs.
- Clans need to control the territory, while L2 castle control is great, outside the castle itself the clans control very little apart from taxes, having a more complex territorial control system would be amazing, I am talking about delegating powers of cities to guild members of the controlling clan or even other guilds,and more complex hierarchies within the guild system that allows for more intricate strategies than just 1 man controls all ( in l2 the clan leader controls everything).
- some sort of bordering system, I am not really asking for build anywhere sort of thing, because the way MMOs are now its gonna be long till someone gets it right, building everywhere just doesnt work for the most part, but I would like to see an improvement on the system where you get a pre-defined piece would be nice to see towns and borders changing, In L2 Aden castle is the main castle and controls every one of them, despite Giran castle being for a very long time the most profitable and most important castle and town, would be nice to see the borders change and powerful territories being able to expand somehow.
- Another thing I would love to see implemented is some sort of government system, this is a very hard request, i myself wouldnt know how this can work so I leave to designers to figure it out, but would be nice to let players have tools in order to build some sort of government system, and I know people say you can do this without any game tools, but it just doesnt work as well in my eyes and some help from developers with some sort of base system would be great.
In conclusion this is really the sort of thing I would like to see, after looking at games like MO I realize I dont really want a full sandbox game, I want a game that can really have theme park elements with tools that help the community grow, despite its grind factor which can eliminated with some so called "theme parked" features I believe L2 offered a nice sandbox elements that NCSoft failed to improve upon. In the end I really do hope TERA developers are taking ideas and concepts from L2.
Wait what? "has been described as a sandbox mmo" ... lol... I really wonder if people are being taught the basics of grammar and the meaning of words and statements.... Here is how I describe Tera:
“Tera is a pink elephant.”
“Tera is responsible for global warming.”
“Tera was built by using 100% all natural soybean extract combined with lemon shavings.”
Alright... Now any one of you could make a thread/post/blog/news story saying that:
“Tera has been described as a pink elephant”
“Tera has been described as being responsible for global warming”
“Tera has been described as being built by using 100% all natural soybean extract combined with lemon shavings.”
And every single one of you would be 100% correct in saying these statements because I did in fact describe Tera as those things. But guess what every single statement that I said about Tera is untrue which means getting all excited about them is a little ridiculous.
Very good point. Add to that the term sandbox means different things to different people and you have an excerize in chaos theory. I think sandbox used to be be a good description for a certain type of games, however, it has now been overused and distorted to the point of not actually having a single definition.
Well it's a very open world, it's enormous theres over 55 different regions in the game. There's some sort of political system, what you do can somehow affect the game world although we haven't heard much about it, yet. So there's definitely alot of things that could happen to make this game a "sandbox". I don't think a game has to be completely void of an end-game and mid-game content in order to be labeled a sandbox.
There's so many different regions in the game, and I think that alone might qualify it as a sandbox MMO. You can play through it differently every time and not run into the same things if you don't want to, for a large chunk of the game.
Well it's a very open world, it's enormous theres over 55 different regions in the game. There's some sort of political system, what you do can somehow affect the game world although we haven't heard much about it, yet. So there's definitely alot of things that could happen to make this game a "sandbox". I don't think a game has to be completely void of an end-game and mid-game content in order to be labeled a sandbox.
There's so many different regions in the game, and I think that alone might qualify it as a sandbox MMO. You can play through it differently every time and not run into the same things if you don't want to, for a large chunk of the game.
Are there classes and levels or is it skill-based. Is there a story and does this story affect the game play or is just a back drop to the game play? Does your actions affect the world a t large? To me those are some important questions that need to be answered to determine if, in my opinion of course, a game is sandbox. LOTRO has a very large world to explore but no one would call it sandbox. It is themepark because the storyline affects the gameplay. EVE on the othere hand has a story line but it is more of a back drop. there are no defined classes per say - some professions but they can be cross trained. As I said in a previous post sandbox is no longer a usuable label.
Well it's a very open world, it's enormous theres over 55 different regions in the game. There's some sort of political system, what you do can somehow affect the game world although we haven't heard much about it, yet. So there's definitely alot of things that could happen to make this game a "sandbox". I don't think a game has to be completely void of an end-game and mid-game content in order to be labeled a sandbox.
There's so many different regions in the game, and I think that alone might qualify it as a sandbox MMO. You can play through it differently every time and not run into the same things if you don't want to, for a large chunk of the game.
Are there classes and levels or is it skill-based. Is there a story and does this story affect the game play or is just a back drop to the game play? Does your actions affect the world a t large? To me those are some important questions that need to be answered to determine if, in my opinion of course, a game is sandbox. LOTRO has a very large world to explore but no one would call it sandbox. It is themepark because the storyline affects the gameplay. EVE on the othere hand has a story line but it is more of a back drop. there are no defined classes per say - some professions but they can be cross trained. As I said in a previous post sandbox is no longer a usuable label.
Lord Of The Rings has a large world to explore but is not Open World.
A: TERA will feature a combination of quests in both the open world and instances.
A: Channels and shards are different in that Channels are parallel instances within the same server, whereas shards are different servers.
A: Quests are a main part of the game
A: PVP will be on a sever-by-server basis
Sorry, I don't see what part of this game would be considered "sandbox." Maybe one of the quests involves killing 10 imps to reclaim the royal sandbox for some king.
No, it makes sense. While TERA may be a sandbox game, it obviously has themepark elements to it. Typically, you don't get 100% themepark or 100% sandbox games, you get hybrids that are closer to sandbox or closer to themeparks than other games.
For example: Fallen Earth is considered a sandbox game, and it has far more sandbox elements than most games out there, however it also relies very heavily on a quest system as the main means of advancement. World of Warcraft is considered very much to be a themepark game, but it has a few sandbox elements, like a huge open world.
Even EVE Online has a quest system where you can do quests to earn equipment, ships and ISK. If EVE was 100% sandbox, there would be absolutely no NPC given quests or quest rewards.
Do i drop into the world with nothing more than a pocket-knife to begin my adventure, and no entitelement uber quest rewards that are better than player-crafted? If not, its 6-flags; which way to the ferris-wheel?
Do i drop into the world with nothing more than a pocket-knife to begin my adventure, and no entitelement uber quest rewards that are better than player-crafted? If not, its 6-flags; which way to the ferris-wheel?
A pocket knife? I see you like those easy-mode themepark games. I don't consider it a true sandbox unless you drop me into the game-world with nothing but a loincloth and my fingernails.
Do i drop into the world with nothing more than a pocket-knife to begin my adventure, and no entitelement uber quest rewards that are better than player-crafted? If not, its 6-flags; which way to the ferris-wheel?
A pocket knife? I see you like those easy-mode themepark games. I don't consider it a true sandbox unless you drop me into the game-world with nothing but a loincloth and my fingernails.
Fingernails? Feh! LUXURY!
Like Skyrim? Need more content? Try my Skyrim mod "Godfred's Tomb."
Do i drop into the world with nothing more than a pocket-knife to begin my adventure, and no entitelement uber quest rewards that are better than player-crafted? If not, its 6-flags; which way to the ferris-wheel?
A pocket knife? I see you like those easy-mode themepark games. I don't consider it a true sandbox unless you drop me into the game-world with nothing but a loincloth and my fingernails.
Both of which will shortly be removed by the high level gank/grief squad thats making the rounds... Enjoy your sand box.... ^^
Originally posted by merieke82 This makes no sense. Q: This game sandbox or theme park? A: TERA has been described as a "sandbox MMO".
The following answers contradict that:
A: TERA will feature a combination of quests in both the open world and instances. A: Channels and shards are different in that Channels are parallel instances within the same server, whereas shards are different servers. A: Quests are a main part of the game A: PVP will be on a sever-by-server basis
Sorry, I don't see what part of this game would be considered "sandbox." Maybe one of the quests involves killing 10 imps to reclaim the royal sandbox for some king.
There can be quests in a sandbox land, but If you "choose" to do them among other things to advance it can be a sandbox, but if the quests are "forced" as a primary means to advance, well then it's not much of a sandbox.. But if there is a game completly void of NPC's the questing would be given to you by other players
A: TERA will feature a combination of quests in both the open world and instances.
A: Channels and shards are different in that Channels are parallel instances within the same server, whereas shards are different servers.
A: Quests are a main part of the game
A: PVP will be on a sever-by-server basis
Sorry, I don't see what part of this game would be considered "sandbox." Maybe one of the quests involves killing 10 imps to reclaim the royal sandbox for some king.
TERA most certainly will be "themeparked". The only sandbos you will find is the PvP system. And knowing the developer's orogin, even that sandbox will be small. BHS is 95% Lineage II / III developers, and I suspect that the open world PvP will use rules of engagement as well as PK (red) status.
I am going to be honest, the political sandbox of Lineage 2 is still one of the best in any MMO in my opinion, to make a really good political pvp game all they have to do is improve on the L2 model which I am sure they will considering their dev team was part of it. it needs more political tools and more meaningful stuff to do with cities and towns even if they are static, the territory control in L2 and the political factions it creates is absolutely amazing and I am hoping that a game either TERA or something else can recreate that and improve on some archaic mechanics of L2 main these:
I never said thatthe L2 PvP "sandbox" system was a wrong one. I started playing MMOs with L2 and I've had my best PvP experiences there. Compared to L2, all other games I've played just had lame PvP, and I'm skipping games that have 2-sided faction PvP, because that mainly comes down to playing "If it moves and now one of us, shoot it", aside from the PvP having no meaning at all other than being game mechanics...
In L2 PvP meant something. You had to use it to gain control (well, hope to gain control) over a castle or fortress. And when you had control over it, you had certain benefits.
Only reason for me to tell TERA would be themeparked, is to warn the players looking for a real sandbox like EVE, Darkfall and MO...
- Static elements in the city, cities in L2 are very detailed but they dont have much functionality, there needs to be more stuff to do , empty buildings need to be occupied etc.. not just geometry around NPCs.
I hope TERA does something about decored cities indeed. The main sity we see all the time is massive to say at least. Lets hope all (or at least most) houses there are used and functional. It would be a big waste of space & design if most of that city appears to be cardboard
In conclusion this is really the sort of thing I would like to see, after looking at games like MO I realize I dont really want a full sandbox game, I want a game that can really have theme park elements with tools that help the community grow, despite its grind factor which can eliminated with some so called "theme parked" features I believe L2 offered a nice sandbox elements that NCSoft failed to improve upon. In the end I really do hope TERA developers are taking ideas and concepts from L2.
I agree with the last part. As I said before, I've had my best PvP experience with L2. Too bad NCSoft US/EU is not really supporting the game and by now it's nearly dead I hope BHS will improve the flaws from L2 and make a massive new gaming experience for the L2 audience, and all players in general!
Well it's a very open world, it's enormous theres over 55 different regions in the game. There's some sort of political system, what you do can somehow affect the game world although we haven't heard much about it, yet. So there's definitely alot of things that could happen to make this game a "sandbox". I don't think a game has to be completely void of an end-game and mid-game content in order to be labeled a sandbox.
There's so many different regions in the game, and I think that alone might qualify it as a sandbox MMO. You can play through it differently every time and not run into the same things if you don't want to, for a large chunk of the game.
Are there classes and levels or is it skill-based. Is there a story and does this story affect the game play or is just a back drop to the game play? Does your actions affect the world a t large? To me those are some important questions that need to be answered to determine if, in my opinion of course, a game is sandbox. LOTRO has a very large world to explore but no one would call it sandbox. It is themepark because the storyline affects the gameplay. EVE on the othere hand has a story line but it is more of a back drop. there are no defined classes per say - some professions but they can be cross trained. As I said in a previous post sandbox is no longer a usuable label.
Lord Of The Rings has a large world to explore but is not Open World.
ok, accepted. But then I wasn't making a case that it was. LOTRO is themepark - there is no doubt of it. It is also one of the best, in my opinion. It doesn't have the numbers that WoW has but that is a good thing considering the low level of the WoW player base. WoW attracts the can't play a game crowd because it is so dumbed down and that is it's purpose. LOTRO is a niche themepark game and is very good at what it does. EOS.
In my personal opinion, a class system doesn't necessarily rule out the possibility of a sandbox. Nor does the existence of quests or structured leveling. To me a sandbox is a game you're able to build within (sandcastles).
If skill based leveling makes a game a sandbox where does that place games like COH, CO and STO? Theses games are nothing like any sandbox I've ever played. During the CU era of SWG was it any less sandbox than it was during pre-cu? I mean it had levels, yet still had skills as well. Which neither affected the world structure within galaxies. The things that made it sandbox were still very much intact.
As for Tera I have no clue whether it is a sandbox or isn't one. With how little information is actually out there, it's hard to say. It seems to be an action rpg to me, that doesn't mean it can't have sandbox elements in how the world is designed. I guess we'll have to wait and see.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson
Comments
Quests and instances do not necessarily mean it is theme park not sandbox. However I would say that pre-determined classes does. To be Sandbox you need to be allowed to develop your character as you see fit without classes. All skill trees should be open and you could create anything - an archer- mage-healer-tank if you wanted - it would probably be useless but you could go that way in a sandbox game. Themepark games also have storylines that rope the player in, whereas Sandbox games have a storyline that is more refence point to the world and a possible source of quests but not something you have to pay attention to to have success in the game. Note: this is my opinion, I am sure some will agree and some will trash me but it is my opinion.
You all have no idea what a Sandbox game is. Just because the game will have classes, levels and some instances does not mean it cant be a Sandbox. As long as the game is not forcing you down a linear path and gives you freedom to explore in an open world the way you want then its a Sandbox game.
If you go look up Sandbox game at Wikipedia it redirects you to Open World game.
An open world is a type of video game level design concept where a player can freely roam a virtual world.[1] The term is sometimes used interchangeably with "sandbox" and "free-roaming".[2][3] Terms such as open world, sandbox and free-roaming allude to the absence of artificial barriers,[4] in contrast to the invisible walls and "loading..." screens that are common in more linear level designs. As with a physical sandbox, the user is entertained by their ability to play creatively, boundless of artificial structural constraints, and with there being "no right way"[5] of playing the game. However, many open world games still enforce restrictions at some points in the game environment, either due to absolute game design limitations or temporary limitations imposed by a game's linearity.
There you have the definition of Sandbox game so please stop saying what a Sandbox game is to you.
so your opinion is that wikipedia is a reliable source, thanks for your opinion - I will go on stating mine, thanks - at least I developed it myself and did not trust the opinion of someone else who just happened to post it on wikipedia.
I guess the truth does hurt.
I don't think so. Even FFXIV is more 'sandbox' than Tera, with it's job-system.
Q: Will there be Super Saiyans?
A: Yes, over 9,000 of them.
Ok, this game has officially won me over..
cool, my respect for you jumped up alot.
This.
PAST: UO-SWG-DAOC-WOW-DDO-VG-AOC-WAR-FE-DFO-LOTRO-RIFT-GW2
PRESENT: Nothing
FUTURE: ESO
FFA full loot gankfest? ^^ That pretty much describes many peoples definition of it...
TERA most certainly will be "themeparked". The only sandbos you will find is the PvP system. And knowing the developer's orogin, even that sandbox will be small. BHS is 95% Lineage II / III developers, and I suspect that the open world PvP will use rules of engagement as well as PK (red) status.
Wait what? "has been described as a sandbox mmo" ... lol... I really wonder if people are being taught the basics of grammar and the meaning of words and statements.... Here is how I describe Tera:
“Tera is a pink elephant.”
“Tera is responsible for global warming.”
“Tera was built by using 100% all natural soybean extract combined with lemon shavings.”
Alright... Now any one of you could make a thread/post/blog/news story saying that:
“Tera has been described as a pink elephant”
“Tera has been described as being responsible for global warming”
“Tera has been described as being built by using 100% all natural soybean extract combined with lemon shavings.”
And every single one of you would be 100% correct in saying these statements because I did in fact describe Tera as those things. But guess what every single statement that I said about Tera is untrue which means getting all excited about them is a little ridiculous.
I am going to be honest, the political sandbox of Lineage 2 is still one of the best in any MMO in my opinion, to make a really good political pvp game all they have to do is improve on the L2 model which I am sure they will considering their dev team was part of it. it needs more political tools and more meaningful stuff to do with cities and towns even if they are static, the territory control in L2 and the political factions it creates is absolutely amazing and I am hoping that a game either TERA or something else can recreate that and improve on some archaic mechanics of L2 main these:
- Static elements in the city, cities in L2 are very detailed but they dont have much functionality, there needs to be more stuff to do , empty buildings need to be occupied etc.. not just geometry around NPCs.
- Clans need to control the territory, while L2 castle control is great, outside the castle itself the clans control very little apart from taxes, having a more complex territorial control system would be amazing, I am talking about delegating powers of cities to guild members of the controlling clan or even other guilds,and more complex hierarchies within the guild system that allows for more intricate strategies than just 1 man controls all ( in l2 the clan leader controls everything).
- some sort of bordering system, I am not really asking for build anywhere sort of thing, because the way MMOs are now its gonna be long till someone gets it right, building everywhere just doesnt work for the most part, but I would like to see an improvement on the system where you get a pre-defined piece would be nice to see towns and borders changing, In L2 Aden castle is the main castle and controls every one of them, despite Giran castle being for a very long time the most profitable and most important castle and town, would be nice to see the borders change and powerful territories being able to expand somehow.
- Another thing I would love to see implemented is some sort of government system, this is a very hard request, i myself wouldnt know how this can work so I leave to designers to figure it out, but would be nice to let players have tools in order to build some sort of government system, and I know people say you can do this without any game tools, but it just doesnt work as well in my eyes and some help from developers with some sort of base system would be great.
In conclusion this is really the sort of thing I would like to see, after looking at games like MO I realize I dont really want a full sandbox game, I want a game that can really have theme park elements with tools that help the community grow, despite its grind factor which can eliminated with some so called "theme parked" features I believe L2 offered a nice sandbox elements that NCSoft failed to improve upon. In the end I really do hope TERA developers are taking ideas and concepts from L2.
Very good point. Add to that the term sandbox means different things to different people and you have an excerize in chaos theory. I think sandbox used to be be a good description for a certain type of games, however, it has now been overused and distorted to the point of not actually having a single definition.
Well it's a very open world, it's enormous theres over 55 different regions in the game. There's some sort of political system, what you do can somehow affect the game world although we haven't heard much about it, yet. So there's definitely alot of things that could happen to make this game a "sandbox". I don't think a game has to be completely void of an end-game and mid-game content in order to be labeled a sandbox.
There's so many different regions in the game, and I think that alone might qualify it as a sandbox MMO. You can play through it differently every time and not run into the same things if you don't want to, for a large chunk of the game.
Are there classes and levels or is it skill-based. Is there a story and does this story affect the game play or is just a back drop to the game play? Does your actions affect the world a t large? To me those are some important questions that need to be answered to determine if, in my opinion of course, a game is sandbox. LOTRO has a very large world to explore but no one would call it sandbox. It is themepark because the storyline affects the gameplay. EVE on the othere hand has a story line but it is more of a back drop. there are no defined classes per say - some professions but they can be cross trained. As I said in a previous post sandbox is no longer a usuable label.
Lord Of The Rings has a large world to explore but is not Open World.
No, it makes sense. While TERA may be a sandbox game, it obviously has themepark elements to it. Typically, you don't get 100% themepark or 100% sandbox games, you get hybrids that are closer to sandbox or closer to themeparks than other games.
For example: Fallen Earth is considered a sandbox game, and it has far more sandbox elements than most games out there, however it also relies very heavily on a quest system as the main means of advancement. World of Warcraft is considered very much to be a themepark game, but it has a few sandbox elements, like a huge open world.
Even EVE Online has a quest system where you can do quests to earn equipment, ships and ISK. If EVE was 100% sandbox, there would be absolutely no NPC given quests or quest rewards.
Do i drop into the world with nothing more than a pocket-knife to begin my adventure, and no entitelement uber quest rewards that are better than player-crafted? If not, its 6-flags; which way to the ferris-wheel?
A pocket knife? I see you like those easy-mode themepark games. I don't consider it a true sandbox unless you drop me into the game-world with nothing but a loincloth and my fingernails.
Fingernails? Feh! LUXURY!
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
Both of which will shortly be removed by the high level gank/grief squad thats making the rounds... Enjoy your sand box.... ^^
There can be quests in a sandbox land, but If you "choose" to do them among other things to advance it can be a sandbox, but if the quests are "forced" as a primary means to advance, well then it's not much of a sandbox..
But if there is a game completly void of NPC's the questing would be given to you by other players
I agree with the last part. As I said before, I've had my best PvP experience with L2. Too bad NCSoft US/EU is not really supporting the game and by now it's nearly dead
I hope BHS will improve the flaws from L2 and make a massive new gaming experience for the L2 audience, and all players in general!
ok, accepted. But then I wasn't making a case that it was. LOTRO is themepark - there is no doubt of it. It is also one of the best, in my opinion. It doesn't have the numbers that WoW has but that is a good thing considering the low level of the WoW player base. WoW attracts the can't play a game crowd because it is so dumbed down and that is it's purpose. LOTRO is a niche themepark game and is very good at what it does. EOS.
In my personal opinion, a class system doesn't necessarily rule out the possibility of a sandbox. Nor does the existence of quests or structured leveling. To me a sandbox is a game you're able to build within (sandcastles).
If skill based leveling makes a game a sandbox where does that place games like COH, CO and STO? Theses games are nothing like any sandbox I've ever played. During the CU era of SWG was it any less sandbox than it was during pre-cu? I mean it had levels, yet still had skills as well. Which neither affected the world structure within galaxies. The things that made it sandbox were still very much intact.
As for Tera I have no clue whether it is a sandbox or isn't one. With how little information is actually out there, it's hard to say. It seems to be an action rpg to me, that doesn't mean it can't have sandbox elements in how the world is designed. I guess we'll have to wait and see.
For every minute you are angry , you lose 60 seconds of happiness."-Emerson