Originally posted by Zylaxx

Originally posted by MMOExposed
What does this have to do with Tera?

Exactly nothing but this is a semi-troll post or at the very least a rant about pre-concieved notions.

 

I will bite though, what I want from a Sandbox is as follows:

 

1. PvP is segregated on their own shards with minimal to zero zupport from the devs.

2. A PvE open world where exploration is the rule rather then the thumb.  Questing from one hub to the next is stupid and stymies creativity and exploration.

3. Classless skill based game with no holy trinity.  Everyone is responsible for their own health useage.

4. a Diablo/Asheron's Call style loot system.

5. No raiding

6. level progression that takes months if not years to reach the level cap.  The journey should be the reward, but that doesnt mean there shouldnt be skill progression in the interem.  So if it takes me 2 months go from level 100 to 101 but in that 2 months ive aquired better gear, a few skills, and a lifetime worths of friends.

7. NO FACTIONS

8. No capitol cities, each village or town you come across should have access to rare crafting patterns and trainers.

9. PLAYER HOUSING IN THE WORLD

10. No flying Mounts

11. Hundreds if not thousands of explorable dungeons with each having a rare boss or mini boss at the end.

12. NO INSTANCING OR PHASING

13. NO BATTLEGROUNDS, PVP SHOULD BE IN THE WORLD

In general, a open game with much freedom especially in the PVP department.

Tera for me is a themepark with cool combat and a few other interesting aspects but its nothing close to a sandbox. Being a themepark doesnt mean it cant be enjoyed for people that prefer sandboxes it just means that they probably wont feel the game enjoyable eough to stay very long.

Acheron's Call is a good example.

Random starting areas, quest hubs all over the world, populated world even out in the middle of nowhere.

I remember when AC was brand new, I was 2 hours of run time out in the middle of nowhere came on a dungeon, went in to explore got stuck in a wall and petitioned a GM for help. He shows up and is like " Hey I didnt know this was out here, hold on lemme look around. " I sat there while the GM explored the dungeon for the first time.

That to me is pretty sandbox.

SWG another example of sandbox...

Anarchy Online to a degree sandbox...

Vanguard...

To even suggest Tera is sandbox just does not compute.

As mentioned above, a sandbox MMORPG is not just about exploring, its about being able to interact with the world and even change it.  So far, only original UO has made a serious attempt.  In UO circa 1997 you were able to do things you can't in SWTOR for instance, such as put plates and food on a table for a feast or sit in a chair.

The real reason we don't see many sandbox games anymore is that it is almost impossible to integrate open world PVP into them.  UO foundered on this - the original beauty of the system was fatally marred by open PVP to the point where they were losing subscribers.  They "Trammelized" the system to limit open PVP because the supposed counterbalance - player justice - was simply not enough.  

Every MMORPG since then has grappled with this dilemna.  Many people do not have killing other players as their top priority for fun.  But in open PVP it doesn't matter what they want - the "hard core PVPers" make the choice for everyone.  And the companies either let their populations plummet as the "hard core PVPers" drive off the rest of their customers.  Or they go "theme park" and severely limit PVP to instances.

Unfortunately, I don't think there is an easy solution.  The key here is human online psychology.  You can create a beautiful, highly detailed and interactive sandbox world like UO.  The designers even had an ecology where animals hunted one another and balanced populations.  But what happened is that once players were let loose on this world, they killed everything in sight faster than it could balance and the ecosystem collapsed.

It is also a fact that advancement in online games is almost 100 percent keyed to killing stuff, whether MOBs or other players.  It is ingrained in players that:

- if I CAN kill, I MUST kill

Not only that - anyone who disagrees, who thinks other activities have value, is a Care Bear who MUST be killed!

The next step is that the killing has to be near-continuous.  It is like crack - players must have greater and greater doses to feel they are accomplishing anything.  I have a Jedi Sentinel in SWTOR at level 25.  She must have killed, by conservative estimates, maybe 5,000 NPC people personally by now.  Add in various MOB creatures and robots and you are probably in six figure range for kills by just one player avatar who is barely half way to max level.   Only a theme park can manage industrial scale slaughter like this.  People are herded down carefully limited paths and targets are placed in their path to ensure that the swords never stop swinging and the blasters never get cool.  At that rate, killing eventually becomes not only meaningless, but boring - many players in SWTOR, sated, are complaining that they can't go from point A to point B without having to butcher half a city.  

Creating a sandbox is not a problem.  Creating a sandbox with open world PVP that doesn't get burned down by its own players is.

I have seen people complain that there isn't enough content in EvE Online... Kind of had to do a double take when I read that.

Lot of misconceptions about sandboxes in this thread.

Just think of free to do as you please type game with a HUGE world open to explore. With large player based economy, crafting that means something. Where you can dabble in a hundred different things. Where you are not led around like a dog on a leash all day.

And BTW, sandbox does not mean open world pvp with full loot like many say it is. Can think of several sandbox games not based on pvp at all.

Its a game with choice, freedoms, and features galore. Biggest one coming up is Archeage and there are 2-3 more coming out by smaller companies but look good.

Originally posted by Cembrye

As mentioned above, a sandbox MMORPG is not just about exploring, its about being able to interact with the world and even change it.  So far, only original UO has made a serious attempt.  In UO circa 1997 you were able to do things you can't in SWTOR for instance, such as put plates and food on a table for a feast or sit in a chair.

The real reason we don't see many sandbox games anymore is that it is almost impossible to integrate open world PVP into them.  UO foundered on this - the original beauty of the system was fatally marred by open PVP to the point where they were losing subscribers.  They "Trammelized" the system to limit open PVP because the supposed counterbalance - player justice - was simply not enough.  

Every MMORPG since then has grappled with this dilemna.  Many people do not have killing other players as their top priority for fun.  But in open PVP it doesn't matter what they want - the "hard core PVPers" make the choice for everyone.  And the companies either let their populations plummet as the "hard core PVPers" drive off the rest of their customers.  Or they go "theme park" and severely limit PVP to instances.

Unfortunately, I don't think there is an easy solution.  The key here is human online psychology.  You can create a beautiful, highly detailed and interactive sandbox world like UO.  The designers even had an ecology where animals hunted one another and balanced populations.  But what happened is that once players were let loose on this world, they killed everything in sight faster than it could balance and the ecosystem collapsed.

It is also a fact that advancement in online games is almost 100 percent keyed to killing stuff, whether MOBs or other players.  It is ingrained in players that:

- if I CAN kill, I MUST kill

Not only that - anyone who disagrees, who thinks other activities have value, is a Care Bear who MUST be killed!

The next step is that the killing has to be near-continuous.  It is like crack - players must have greater and greater doses to feel they are accomplishing anything.  I have a Jedi Sentinel in SWTOR at level 25.  She must have killed, by conservative estimates, maybe 5,000 NPC people personally by now.  Add in various MOB creatures and robots and you are probably in six figure range for kills by just one player avatar who is barely half way to max level.   Only a theme park can manage industrial scale slaughter like this.  People are herded down carefully limited paths and targets are placed in their path to ensure that the swords never stop swinging and the blasters never get cool.  At that rate, killing eventually becomes not only meaningless, but boring - many players in SWTOR, sated, are complaining that they can't go from point A to point B without having to butcher half a city.  

Creating a sandbox is not a problem.  Creating a sandbox with open world PVP that doesn't get burned down by its own players is.

It's so funny reading a WoW player trying to describe a Sandbox MMO. Your post is clearly a few weeks of Sandbox experience. You my friend are far from the truth of what a Sandbox MMO. 

Originally posted by brody71

Almost everything seems to be a "linear themepark".  What is stopping the "sandbox" crowd from simply not picking up the quests, and going out and exploring the worlds that the developers have created?

Not sure why this is in the Tera forums as Tera has nothing to a Sandbox game..

Plus as a sandbox+pvp fan i know exactly what i want.. sadly we will never have a AAA title that does it because they think there is no money in it so they just carry on copying WOW.. but like someone said above Sandbox does not have to me full loot pvp..

Tho Tera with its combat system is a step in the right direction thats for sure :)

Originally posted by Caldrin

Originally posted by brody71

Almost everything seems to be a "linear themepark".  What is stopping the "sandbox" crowd from simply not picking up the quests, and going out and exploring the worlds that the developers have created?

Not sure why this is in the Tera forums as Tera has nothing to a Sandbox game..

 

Plus as a sandbox+pvp fan i know exactly what i want.. sadly we will never have a AAA title that does it because they think there is no money in it so they just carry on copying WOW.. but like someone said above Sandbox does not have to me full loot pvp..

 

Tho Tera with its combat system is a step in the right direction thats for sure :)

TERA has the political aspect...that's a sandbox feature. While it doesnt make TERA a sandbox game it's still a feature in the right direction and is "sandboxy".

Originally posted by Caldrin

Plus as a sandbox+pvp fan i know exactly what i want.. sadly we will never have a AAA title that does it because they think there is no money in it so they just carry on copying WOW.. but like someone said above Sandbox does not have to me full loot pvp..

Have a few good sandbox games coming out soon. If they do well, this may change. Have to many console rpg gamers that want the mmo's to be like those games, and realy hurt the industry. But i see that changing soon as most gamers are tired of the exact same thing being released lately. Almost all the top games released in the past 5 years have been the exact same, and going down hill.

Archeage may bring a turn as well as a few others coming up. To many misconceptions and uneducated gamers that have never tried a real sandbox realy does hurt this style og mmo. Dont know why anyone would want a linear dumbed down game, when they could have a huge world to dabble with. Then again lack of creativity in todays society i guess transfers into our games as well :)

Originally posted by brody71

Almost everything seems to be a "linear themepark".  What is stopping the "sandbox" crowd from simply not picking up the quests, and going out and exploring the worlds that the developers have created?

Aimlessly wandering and not doing quests, especially when it means actively working against the design of the game, has nothing to do with the sandbox gameplay or the interest in it by players that want it.

Different people who want sandboxes want different things.  Just like different people who want theme parks want different things.  There are some good sandbox games out there, and a lot of players are happily playing them, even.  Most of the sandbox whining seems to come from people who want a free for all full loot PVP sandbox that is pretty polished.  They're having a hard time finding what they want, but then, someone who wanted a polished free for all full loot PVP theme park game doesn't have too many options, either.

Originally posted by brody71

Almost everything seems to be a "linear themepark".  What is stopping the "sandbox" crowd from simply not picking up the quests, and going out and exploring the worlds that the developers have created?

I suppose that I might as well address the original post.  Wanting a sandbox game isn't just about not wanting to jump from quest hub to quest hub.  After all, if you always go AFK when you're online, you'll skip all of the quests just fine.  But you'll also be tremendously bored.  Rather, people want something else to do instead of quests, or perhaps in addition to quests.  If quests are all that a game has to offer and you don't do the quests, then you'll be bored.

As for exploration, there are several problems.  One is that most games just don't have that much to explore.  If you play WoW and wander around and see everything once, then what?  If not for the mobs trying to kill you and various things gated off by level, it wouldn't take very long to see everything in the game.  Most MMORPGs have a much smaller game world than that, even.

Next is the problem of "if not for mobs trying to kill you".  If there are a bunch of level 50 mobs in a zone, then you'd better not enter unless you're close to level 50 yourself.  Some games won't let you enter at all until you're high enough level.  If all you want to do is go exploring, and you have to spend 95% of your time doing stupid things to grind for levels in order to be able to explore the higher level areas, then that just doesn't work very well.

Third, most games don't have much for you to find even if you do go exploring.  There might be a few easter eggs here and there.  There might be some cool-looking buildings or landscapes.  But even if you go out searching for such things, the game will constantly beat you over the head with, "You should be grinding for levels.  You're wasting your time.  You're falling further behind people who are out grinding for levels.  You're a failure at this game."  Uncharted Waters Online is the only MMORPG I'm aware of that actually encourages players to go exploring.

-Themeparks crafting/gathering sucks in comparison to sandboxes. Typically in sandboxes you see a river. You gather water from the river. You can cook the water or just drink it. Or bring it back to cook with. Or use it in potions from plants youve crushed for alchemy. In themeparks nodes are retarded- They are big and shiny. In sandboxes the grass you stand on can be picked or any rock you see can be mined. <<<----- at least the sandboxes with good crafting are like this.

-I dont want quests in my sandbox. I want to create my own "Meta-game".

-Typically sandboxes are skill-point based, and themeparks are level-based. If you swim... your swimming skill goes up. If you eat food, your taste-identification or sophistication goes up. I hate levels.

So yes we know what we want... at least I do.