Don't hate me for asking this.  I never thought I'd ask this on a thread, and truthfully the number of times I see these threads is a tad annoying.  Egads and now I'm doing it.

I've been around the block with MMO's.  EQ took my cherry just after Velious expansion.  I liked it, even though at times it made me want to gauge out my eyes.  Didn't like EQ2, felt too closed off and could never really identify with my characters.  I do play WoW off and on and have at least tried most of the pay to play ones out there.  Currently downloading Entropia (or Calypso I guess)  because of an interesting review I just read.

I am playin CoH right now but for the last 6 months (actually have 42 months into it) I've only been playing to get Prestige for the basebuilding.  The base building is fun and incredibly diverse.  You can make some pretty imaginative rooms.

I'm also currently playing Istaria (previously Horizons) because dragons are cool, I can design a plot and lair anyway I want and I can learn any skill I want.

However when coming home after a long days work, often I'm tired and just want to relax, this is way themepark handholding is nice.  No difficulties just fun relaxation.  So themeparks are good for this.

On the weekends and vacations I have more time and like to explore, develop my characters further and do a bit more socializing.  This is where sandbox is good.

So is there any game that meets this criteria?  A combination of themepark and sandbox to let you play how you want when you want.  A game that lets you customize your character and yet gives advice on different paths.  A game that lets you develop a peice of land as you chose to, and not just given an apartment to decorate like EQ2, to at least give the illusion of something that can be seen and touched in the world, and more than just 2 or 3 styles of houses.

I'd like to find an MMO home rather than several different homes, I kinda feel like a vagabond. 

Any thoughts?

Venge Sunsoar

Lord of the Rings Online has housing.It's instanced but the instances are called neighborhoods and have a bunch of houses in each one and the area they are in look really nice.Each race has their own differant looking houses and neighborhood environments.Theres lots of decorations too and you can even decorate the outside and pick a music theme to play when you go into the house.

There's character customization in the form of deed/trait system.I'm sure you've already looked into the game but in case you haven't, you should try the free trial and look info about the game up.LotRO also has some great roleplaying possibilities like the casual equipment that can be toggled on and off to show instead of your stat gear and also the music system, where you can actually play music using the numbers on your key board.The world is seamless like WoW too, and looks great.The deed/trait system also encouraged exploring.

My my I didn't even know there was an LFgame section, how long as this been here?

Venge Sunsoar

Saga of Ryzom.

Great community, skill system, massive open world, pvp areas, spell customization, great gathering and crafting and alot more.

Yeah It's a sandbox actually one of the only pve focused sandbox games since we lost Swg.