Day 20: Sandbox

What kind of turtle eats sand?

Remember when you were a little kid and you dreamed up everything that you could possibly imagine and put those dreams down into sand?  I recall that I created massive cities with Matchbox and Hot Wheels cars.  I carefully crafted each and every building with loving hands and sculpted until my fingers ached.  Once I had created the most excellent city that my young mind could think of, I parked all of the cars as if citizens were living out their days in a city of sand.  Then I would build a volcano. At the center of that volcano was a hose.  Once the hose switched on, I was the master of that tiny city, I alone controlled its fate.  I sprayed and sprayed until the entire city and it's inhabitants were washed away in the flood or the ensuing mudslides.  Sadistic, right?  But, left to your own devices, didn't you do much of the same?  These types of experiences now translate to what the industry calls Sandbox games.

Sandboxy goodness.

The recent Grand Theft Auto games are a perfect and shining example of the Sandbox genre, one of the first that I played too.  This game doesn't go so far as to city destruction, but it does provide us with a context.  As the character you are free to do whatever quests you want, just fuck around with the rest of the city, or complete all of the side-quests.  Me, I complete the main quests first.  As I do, I unlock other parts of the city or various weapons that I didn't have in the first place.  After I get to a certain point, where I think I can hold my own against the rest of the city, I run around and just fucking unload in the most populated area I can find and fight until I die.  The other fun thing that I like to do is find the highest point and take a sniper rifle to town.  Now of course one couldn't do this without a complete separation of fantasy and reality.  Obviously I have no intentions of doing this in real life.

Assassins are great fun at parties like this one.

Another sandbox game that I rather enjoy is Assassin's Creed.  Though it's much more structured than your GTA, it's still got that sandbox feel of running all around the city.  And it's different in that you run ALL AROUND the city.  You flip, jump, wall run, and acrobat your way around the entire place.  It's sandbox in it's freedom of movement.  Sure there are quests to do, but there are challenges of movement that help you out as well.  Another game that had similar movement controls, and was also mission based is Prototype.  In that game you control a genetically-enhanced human that needs to save the world.  The controls are similar to Assassin's Creed, but the missions differ and there's a bit more sandboxyness.  Yeah, I know it's not a word, but I hold creative control over this blog...so there.

To date I haven't seen a console game that really rivals my all-time favorite of Black and White for being a sandbox game.  You are literally a god that controls, helps, and terrorizes an entire world.  You have a creature that can carry out your designs or you can directly help or hinder your villagers.  I loved this game when it first came out, but it had some issues.  Number one, it was pretty much broken.  I couldn't, for the life of me, figure out most of the shit that I had to do.  Number two, it was hard to play.  The controls just didn't feel right for the game itself.  For now, I need to continue my search for the perfect sandbox game.  My question for you is, how do you play your sandbox games?  Do you just fuck around with everything or do you quest until you can't quest any further?  As for me, I think I might go back to my cars and hose.