"Sandbox gameplay" is one of those ambiguous terms in game development that is used a lot, but rarely defined.
To Matthew Woodward, senior designer at EVE Online developer CCP, "sandbox" is just a mindset in which his studio operates on a daily basis.
"['Sandbox'] is really hard to define, because it's so ingrained in what we do, that we know what it is, but it's hard to put into words," he tells Gamasutra.
But he offers up a pretty good definition anyhow. "Basically it's three things: being social, goal-driven and emergent -- making a game open, giving players control, essentially, and if you're making a multiplayer game, making it as social as possible, because that's why they're playing the game in the first place."
Woodward posits that emergence is likely the most important aspect, and it's something to concentrate on whether you're making a single-player sandbox game or a multiplayer game.
CCP is a studio that knows a thing or two about open-ended MMOs. EVE Online is nearly 10 years old now, and its trademarks are exactly the three elements that Woodward uses to describe sandbox games. EVE's player-driven economy, professions and close ties with the community have all helped the game standout from World of Warcraft copies, and carve a successful niche of its own.
 Key to EVE's success is grasping what it means for an MMO to be self-sustaining. Woodward explains CCP's approach. "Essentially, you need the emergence, you need the openness.
"The big enemy is rest states -- a place where players keep on doing the same things over and over again. That's the big thing that's going to drag down your open-endedness. That and obviously if a player can finish [the game], it's not open-ended," he says."
That open-endedness can translate into longevity for an online game. "[The game has to enable] an ongoing balance. Anything that supports competitive-type gameplay, trying to be the best at something, is really good for open-endedness, because you can have that back-and-forth between players, and you always try to get it back when you lose it," says Woodward.Narrative vs. sandboxThere's one element that is not mentioned in Woodward's definition of "sandbox," or in his explanation of self-sustaining gameplay: narrative. There is in fact a lot of narrative that happens in EVE, but it's primarily player-driven. Woodward is skeptical that game-driven narrative can really work successfully in an MMO.
"It seems to me, from my very EVE-centric perspective, that there's a lot of value in narrative gameplay, and there's a lot of value in MMOs," he says. "It's not crystal clear to me how merging those two things together is the best possible way to enhance them both. It seems like they're pushing in different directions, and trying to be different kinds of games.
"For me, and for the way I look at games, those two types of games are not obvious bedfellows, and I wonder whether what kind of compromises you're making when you're trying to get those to mesh together nicely are worth what you're trying to achieve.
"If you're trying to achieve a single-player experience, it's not obvious to me how that's benefiting from a creative point of view from being embedded in a very highly-social multiplayer game."
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I think the best of scripted stories can't compare to the ones we experience ourselves. "Player-created" stories aren't meant to be Biblical; they just are. Human nature describes itself daily, and so it should in MMO gameplay.
Sandbox games are cool, but they have some inherent weaknesses, and one of those is the abscence of interesting narrative. That's just a strength of linear games, and it's something they will always do better. Instead of trying to compete with linear games on their own terms, sandbox games should embrace the particular things they do well.
And it's worth noting that even sandbox games can have linear narratives, like the Grand Theft Auto games. Very sandboxy games, but the mission structure and narratives contained within are extremely linear. Of course those games don't have good narratives, but I kind of enjoy some of them on a so bad it's good level.
i think the degree to which metagaming becomes a key factor in player enjoyment by adding layers of depth to the gameplay and in playing the game successfully is also important in sandbox games like EVE. This probably falls under the "emergent" category Woodward mentioned.
Openness I think then must refer to how many processes and systems in the game are being simulated at a low level\fine grain as opposed to mostly faked. Minecraft is a great example of how the existance of certain low level simulations allows the player to do unexpected whacky things like construct functioning virtual processors in the game. Gary's Mod is another interesting example.
In sandbox games players get to star in their own episodes of "Have Imagination - Will Travel."
Perhaps discussions like this are also part of the sandbox.
Now the bucket and spade is a metaphor for any tools given to the user within the boundaries of the world and must abide by it's laws. However the problem arises when you cross your world with someone else s. For example on a minecraft server when you enter and they are building a castle, you might want to destroy that castle, who then has the right? the owner of the server? what if neither player owns the server?
So the owner of the server starts applying additional rules to stop griefing or disruptive behavior, then you add loose objectives for those that choose not to create their own goals, suddenly what was a sandbox is starting to look like more of a set of lego, where you can't do whatever you want, you can only do whatever the pieces you have allow.
Minecraft, to me, was a sandbox, right up until they applied server restrictions and added an end game objective. I'm not sure what I would classify it as now.
I think true sandbox design can only exist within the realm of like minded people, but in order to do that, you have to make rules and restrictions which hinder the nature of what a sandbox is.
Players will define their own goals in a sandbox game, but the *developer* dictating goals (as in most MMOGs) is pretty much the opposite of the sandbox as usually understood. It's like giving a kid a toy shovel and telling him that he can only use it to dig 5 eight-inch holes in specific locations. Offering an in-game benefit for achieving those goals (or monetizing them) doesn't make that more sandboxy.
Maybe that's the real question: is it misleading to describe a game as a sandbox game if its _primary_ gameplay is designed around developer-imposed narrative or goals?
Give a kid a toy shovel and tell him there is an amazing toy buried out there...and whover has the highest tower in 10 minutes will be rewarded. Do whatever you want.
Is this a sandbox with goals, or is it defacto restriction because you will only be rewarded for select things (unless you are extremely strong willed and are satisfied with your own personal reward system)
On its face your example seems pretty sandboxy. You're not constraining how to build the highest tower in ten minutes.
On the other hand, what about all the things the player might be doing instead of building a tower? What if he had years to play instead of just ten minutes?
I'm not trying to pick holes in your specific example; I'm interested in the larger point that developer-specified goals tend to reduce sandboxiness. There's no bright line, but eventually you have to say a game that limits player actions to specific goals is so not-sandboxy that it's not longer accurate to say it is one.
There's plenty of gray area. Modern Bethesda games are pretty good examples: Oblivion and Skyrim both create a large, open world filled with "stuff," drop you into it, and say, "have fun!" At that point you can (and I usually do) go wherever and start creating my own stories through my choices of actions. But these games also offer a specific main quest line combining both developer narrative and developer activities. So is that sandboxy or not?
I'd say it's not, not really, not in the way that something like Minecraft has become the ur-sandbox game. The presence of the main questline means that that's how some players will experience the game; for them it's not a sandbox at all. More specifically, open-world games are not about creative, constructive gameplay, which I'd say is a defining characteristic of a sandbox game. You can build your own narrative history, which might fairly be considered a kind of sandboxiness... but that's not what people think of when deciding whether some game is or isn't a sandbox game.
On balance, I think the presence of goals doesn't disqualify a game from being a sandbox game. But that's why I was careful to emphasize the word "_primary_" in my question. If the core of the game is about dictating specific outcomes -- even if the specific steps taken to get there can be player-determined -- then I think I'd say that game doesn't qualify as being called a sandbox game. It might have some sandbox features, but it extinguishes too many possibilities of play to really merit that categorization.
I'm open to other good arguments, though.
You have to decide early on if you want to make a game, or a simulation.
Games like Minecraft are simulations, they are not in of themselves games (speaking in the traditional sense of the word).
The gameplay comes from the players and what they decide to do. I.e. giving the kid a shovel and a (physical) sandbox. It can also be compared to doll-houses and other simulacrums given to children to emulate real-life counterparts.
I think that it doesn't matter if the sandbox features restrictions or incentives as long as the gameplay comes from the player and is emergent from the tools provided (for it to be called a sandbox).
Even if you set up a restriction that you can only use the shovel 10 times, the "gameplay" will be largely dependent on the imagination of the player.
For it to not be a sandbox, the gameplay must be provided by the developer. i.e. you create a game around the sandbox and shovel with rules and goals.
For example you not only restrict that you can only build sandcastles, but that also that the largest sandcastle "wins".
I'm struggling here to describe accurately what I mean because our language is still a bit murky in these matters. Especially the word "game" encompasses far too many contradictory definitions that it becomes really hard to talk about its subgenres (which are equally ill defined).
I would really wished we would draw a clear line between simulations and games.
Many modern games have both sandbox elements and game elements. When you talk about adding "goals" to a game, you're talking about adding a game element, which certainly does reduce the amount of "sandboxiness" if you want to put it that way. But that's good; I think that in general most games should try not to be too sandboxy, because if there are no restrictions or goals it's too easy to lose interest. A balance between emergent gameplay and developer crafted gameplay is probably always going to be the best bet.
Perhaps a better example is a kid sitting next to a sandbox with a remote control car in the sandbox, with one button that, when pushed, operates a shovel on the car to dig out a very specific amount of sand and another button places that sand in a very specific conical shape.
"But I want to build a sand castle with square towers!"
"Sorry Johnny, we didn't design the car to do that."
Ultimately, the "freedom" in the sandbox relies on the tools provided to the players in that sandbox. It's not so much that the developer is taking someone in a free situation and imposing restrictions so much as providing opportunities. It's not binding the normal kids arms, it's giving a rather crude mechanical arm to the amputee.
The problem we face with most "sandbox" games now is a lack of tools. This will be fun, that will be fun, but we can't do anything else because it breaks the game balance.
A sandbox game can be open and single player.
Goal driven seems to be a contradiction to what he's defining.
Some people are making comments about the restrictions versus none in a real sandbox, that's not a valid argument. A real life sandbox has constraints: box size, gravity, weight/dryness/stickiness of the sand, what toys are available in the sandbox, etc. Some of these are laws of physics and some are artificial circumstances such as "can my parents afford that Tonka truck I want".