Originally posted by MMOExposed

Originally posted by Bladestrom

Originally posted by MMOExposed

Originally posted by sagil

Sandbox should actually have more content than themepark. Take this as an example of a feature: quests (i dont like seeing just terrain, i would like to go on missions and uncover the history of the world) that give fame to particular factions. Since in sandbox you skill up instead of going up in levels so you can freely choose what to be.

 

It's too bad only small budget developers are making sandbox games.

Sandbox with lots of contents is a Theme Park.

 try reading through the threads you create:

Sandbox core is about cultivating and maintaining a stable community and economy.

Thempark core is about offering activities and accessability. 

Both over varying layers of functionality/gameplay on top of this.  End game may or may not be relevant.  A lot of confusion comes from the comparison of the layers.  And based on this adding extra stuff to either type of game does not change its format as long as the core is maintained.  re OP.

Contents = more Activities to do.

 

Again,,, its fits even your definition.

Sandbox with lots of Contents(activities to do) = Themepark

 In a way I agree with this. But I don't consider "content", as the only way to have activities. Content, in a themepark, is a mechanically placed design for players to approach and complete. It's a ride such as in a themepark by almost all accounts.

Sandbox's can have less mechanical "content" providing activies. But instead emphasise on world design, combat mechanics, factional mechanics, player communities, ect. Then allow players to make their own "activities".

Originally posted by clbembry

I think the best example of a sandbox is Minecraft.

I repeat this quite a bit, but here goes again...

I believe that Minecraft is to the next generation of MMO what the DIKU MUD was to the current generation of MMO.

The current generation is based around a text scroller, and the holdovers from that era are limiting factors.  Minecraft holds the spot that DIKU muds had back in the day (Full sandbox/full indie/rock-solid popularity) but from the ground up it is designed to be platform-independent, mobile-ready and three dimensional in its control system.

I'd love to see new MMOs derived from the Minecraft scheme in the way that the current generation is derived from DIKU.

I tried

Let see a sandbox = box filled with sand, where kids can go in with their shovels and shape the sand how they like. There are restriction to what a kid could make due to gravity and type of sand available. But the kids have the full freedom to do what they want in that box. Or if there are other kids there as well, then there is also the restriction of supervision to make sure the kids don't start throwing the sand out the box or keep kids from tearing each other apart.

Translated to games this would be equivelant to give the players a gameworld and the options so they can shape the world how they see fit. There is a ruleset that has to be followed by the players (supervision). This ruleset is controled by the developers. Also the developers have to make sure there is enough content (sand) what players can use to shape the world.

Next we got the Themeparks, these are parks with all types of attractions people can visit. These attractions are picked by the themepark owners. The visitors of the park pick wich attractions they want to do but don't influence directly which attractions will be available in the park.

Translated to games this would be equivelant to a gameworld where players have all types of things to do, they chose which they want to do. But no matter what they do they won't have any influence in things there are to. The devs could indeed put a progression in there making it so that you only gain access to certain content (attractions) when certain conditions are met.

I like themeparks and sandboxes equally well. (A couple people's heads just exploded).

Originally posted by astoria

I like themeparks and sandboxes equally well. (A couple people's heads just exploded).

Same as I do, it depens on my mood. If I'm in the mood to just relax with not much input I launch one of the themepark mmorpgs. However if I want to acclomplish something and can be bothered to put enough into it I launch of the more sandbox games.

While in theory the idea of a sandbox game sounds appealing, it actually doesn't work out to be as nice as people believe it to be, just take Eve Online for example.  Recently some guy stole 200 billion ISK from the Ebank, what if you were one of the people who had investments therein and lost your money because of it?

Sandboxes give too much freedom to players, and noone is restricting the social climes, so people can mistreat eachother, for every good thing that can be had there is an equally disadvantageous aspect of it.  Scamming and Hacking become far easier with little to no moderators actively seeking and banning people who do this kind of thing.  Right now Eve is experiencing a lot of blatant scammers and its the reason I won't touch the game no matter how great it could be.  As someone who's been hacked by the gold farmer of my FRIEND who bought gold (actually told me he didn't know i was a gold farmer since my hacked toon delivered his currency, which later helped me regain my acct from the hacker), as someone who's watched people scam or attempt to scam others its just so off-putting.  At least in theme-parks you have some regulation, not including wow, botters and farmers are very blatant over there now, and since half of wow's population is in china where the most botters/farmers/sellers are its no surprise.  Most other theme-park games provide a disadvantage to people who like to ruin games.

I know my views are weird and why I want the theme-park over the sandbox seems strange,  I should be more concerned about content and gameplay however, when I build my experience, when I work so hard to level and achieve things it becomes part of my gaming signature of that game.  Having people rip me off or steal it from me just ruins my fun, so I'd rather a game I know will keep that kind of foulplay to a minimum.  Not saying all sandboxes are the same, its just how I feel after having lost so much, the biggest thing I want is game security.(swtor and game tokens like the authenticator for wow will also help along with onscreen keyboard against keylogging sons of ...)

Originally posted by imagirl01

I know my views are weird and why I want the theme-park over the sandbox seems strange,  I should be more concerned about content and gameplay however, when I build my experience, when I work so hard to level and achieve things it becomes part of my gaming signature of that game.  Having people rip me off or steal it from me just ruins my fun, so I'd rather a game I know will keep that kind of foulplay to a minimum.  Not saying all sandboxes are the same, its just how I feel after having lost so much, the biggest thing I want is game security.(swtor and game tokens like the authenticator for wow will also help along with onscreen keyboard against keylogging sons of ...)

Nah, that doesn't sound too weird to me.  Playing a game where literally anybody can backstab or scam you in some way, and you're fully aware that there are people out there who play long-term multi-year scams...

... can be sort of stressful.  If you're playing a game to relax, that can definitely be offputting.

On an unrelated side note, your name would be way more awesome if you were actually a guy RL.

i totally LOVE sandboxes when i have the time to play em..if im in the mood i dont mind playing a type of theampark mmo but the thing the really gets me is when im playing the theampark game im like "eh why am i paying a monthly fee for this" because most theampark games >imo< feel like they should be f2p compared to most sandboxs that are full of things to do and have tonz of content ..i just have a totally diff feel when playing sandbox to theampark

THIS  is the best topic in mmorpg.com 

Did you know, I've played over 200 mmorpgs, and I have to say, Ultima online is the Best one.

I am playing it as I type this message, i am running my own shard for 10 yrs now, and have been playing for about 15, and playing Ultima single player for about 20 or so years.  

I Love 2D artwork, pixels and all that tiny item dungeon crawling stuff, is the best.

Full loot, Real Danger, Custom Housing, ..

You cant beat it.  Everything else is an action RPG.  Games like wow, everquest, or w.e you guys call "theme park" games, are basicly Action / stratigy RPGs.  NOT true role-playing games (like D&D, Ultima, warhammer, shadowbane etc...)

These "fake" RPGs are just stratigy games in sheeps clothing lol.  

You noobs and ur hotkeys, I swear to god, write me a good character sheet, roll the dice, pick up 50 to 100 items in 20 seconds, cus if you dont, youll die AGAIn, and get looted, or ganked.

You guys that play theme-park or w.e type games, dont know what its like to FAIL in an online RPG and lose ALL ur stuff.

Long Live Sandbox RPGs.  Cus they are really the only real true role-playing games with real loss and gains.

Starwars Gallaxys is another example of a true-RPG.

make an mmorpg designed like old-school Wizardry, or final fantasy.. now That I would play. ;)

Originally posted by rrashintoast

THIS  is the best topic in mmorpg.com 

Did you know, I've played over 200 mmorpgs, and I have to say, Ultima online is the Best one.

 

I am playing it as I type this message, i am running my own shard for 10 yrs now, and have been playing for about 15, and playing Ultima single player for about 20 or so years.  

 

I Love 2D artwork, pixels and all that tiny item dungeon crawling stuff, is the best.

 

Full loot, Real Danger, Custom Housing, ..

 

You cant beat it.  Everything else is an action RPG.  Games like wow, everquest, or w.e you guys call "theme park" games, are basicly Action / stratigy RPGs.  NOT true role-playing games (like D&D, Ultima, warhammer, shadowbane etc...)

These "fake" RPGs are just stratigy games in sheeps clothing lol.  

You noobs and ur hotkeys, I swear to god, write me a good character sheet, roll the dice, pick up 50 to 100 items in 20 seconds, cus if you dont, youll die AGAIn, and get looted, or ganked.

You guys that play theme-park or w.e type games, dont know what its like to FAIL in an online RPG and lose ALL ur stuff.

 

Long Live Sandbox RPGs.  Cus they are really the only real true role-playing games with real loss and gains.

 

Starwars Gallaxys is another example of a true-RPG.

make an mmorpg designed like old-school Wizardry, or final fantasy.. now That I would play. ;)

Couldn't agree more about Ultima Online. I've been playing MMO's since it beta'ed, and there's still nothing that even comes close to offering the amount of freedom and choice that UO did. Even when you look at the private shard community, the engine itself is capable of doing incredible things, and the vast permeatations of play are proof of that.

yeah man your right. People can hate on it for the graphics, but its not about the graphics, its about the in-depthness of the game.

Games that you can play by button mashing, are just not my thing ^.^

Originally posted by Borick

Originally posted by clbembry

I think the best example of a sandbox is Minecraft.

I repeat this quite a bit, but here goes again...

 

I believe that Minecraft is to the next generation of MMO what the DIKU MUD was to the current generation of MMO.

The current generation is based around a text scroller, and the holdovers from that era are limiting factors.  Minecraft holds the spot that DIKU muds had back in the day (Full sandbox/full indie/rock-solid popularity) but from the ground up it is designed to be platform-independent, mobile-ready and three dimensional in its control system.

I'd love to see new MMOs derived from the Minecraft scheme in the way that the current generation is derived from DIKU.

I would love to see a trend in that direction, Borick.

@MMOExposed     Was hoping for a response, bro.

For the benefits of all players , we need hybrids of the two, we need to stop focusing on one or the other, and start building and developing MMO's with both aspects, some might be themepark heavy and others might be sandbox heavy, but from what I can see, any true Sandbox MMO will only have a small population of gamers and Themepark games will be heavy on population in the beginning but it won't last. But if you combine the two, i think we would have the winner formula.

I think Lucioon has the right idea. A mix of the two would really make an exceptional game. I know that sounds like an airy-fairy solution, "Oh just mix them! ^^" but what I mean is have a sandbox world with themepark aspects to it, to add the extra dimension.

For the next generation MMO though, I think what will define it is if it's a living, breathing world on a grand scale. I believe that the future of the genre (which is very uninspired and boring right now for the most part), to quote a developer, lies in a game where you can go over the horizon, only to find another horizon, and another after that. The world definitely needs to matter too; the themepark aspect of levelling is so jarring and immersion-destroying. ALL content has to truly matter, not just end-game. We, the players, need to focus on today, and not tomorrow IMO. 

I agree with the 2 above me.

A mix of Sandbox and Themepark would be the best way to go with an MMO (IMHO).

A Dynamic Open World where players can go where they want, when they want (to PvE/PvP/Resource Gather/Craft/Build/etc), but also have NPCs/Terminals that give missions/quests, dungeons to raid and other Themepark elements.

I dont really understand why it has to be one or the other

We the gamer was the ones that started labeling the MMO as an Sandbox or Themepark. Before the labeling it was just MMO

Lets get back to it being just an MMO, mix both features however you want, I believe we just want a game that caters to most if not all players and provide us with a living, breathing virtual world that we can call home for a few hours a day without any worries. And having the ability to act out our murderous rage by killing virtual bunnies or ogres without having to go to jail.

So go and find those funds that you need, and lets do it !!!!