Sandbox vs Scripted

[reddo]

Debates have erupted throughout the land of internets, as to whether or not online games ought to be sandbox or scripted. A little insight on what the two terms mean:
Sandbox: Open world, user generated content. The players can shape the world to their whim, although story does not have a strong grip.
ex. wurm online

Scripted: The players are guided by the storyline and quests to play the game. A disadvantage of a scripted game is limited content.
ex. Halo (single player campaign, but still scripted)

Some online games use both sandbox and pre-determined content. But which of the two should have a larger effect on the game?

[Ravik]

I feel like a lot of games out there lack in story, content, and freedom. A lot of games put you through an almost single path as you do quests in an order with the final goal to cap your level. The majority of these quests are so very similar that it's hard to count them as new content or even content at all after you've done them 20 times before.
Then you have time sinks, which are simply there to make tasks take more time than they should.
I enjoy the sandbox freedom more than the linear path but its still possible to have terrible story and content both ways.

[Ronin]

After nearly 3 hours of forum perusing I have decided that this is where I shall lay my first step!
How's that for an entrance?

Personally I have preferred games that were more open and simply "pushed" your character towards the big ending. One of the things I've liked a lot about the NWN franchise was the many different paths that were able to be taken and with HOtU the ending was based upon many factors, alignment, in game actions, final decisions in the last act, etc. One of the redeeming qualities of WoW, not many of those though, was the lack of a distinct path you were set on, you could skip quests avoid some things, act peaceful or be a warmonger.

I'd like to see Kaos War to have a little more open ended path, but have a general story that your character could lead towards.

In short I would like to see a world that would be like a park, lots of different winding paths to get to where you are going.

[MESS14H]

In short I would like to see a world that would be like a park, lots of different winding paths to get to where you are going.

Ive always like to have the option to persue my own path through the game also. Having a system were you have varios different story arks open up depending on the actions you take is something develepors at first impliment into their games but then soon backtrack on.
two expamples of this are EQ2.
EQ2 removed the quest arks to aquire new classes completely and simply gave players the option to simply chose there class at the very start.
And Age of Conan.
Age of Conan Origionaly had plans to implament Prestiege classes with quest arks opening up at lvl 40 to access them but were droped to allow the game an earlyer release of the game.

Ive always been a player that keeps his quest log full, never wanting to drop a quest even if it isnt worthwhile completing it any longer. questing in wow dosnt seem to serve any perpose other than to gain exp and kit for your charecter and the internet is littered with stratagy guides on how to simply lvl the fastest, complete only the most nessisary quests to gain the most usefull items, and what dungeons to farm to get the best drops.

I must of spend 90% of the time i play MMOs running around the same areas and dungeons that i ground the previos day rather than exploring new areas and content due to Time sinks being implamented in order to curve the rate at wich i devoure the games content. And then only to acheive what every other player of my class was acheiving, had acheived, or wanted to acheive.

[Ronin]

I actually haven't played EQ2 or Conan, however I found that with a lot of the MMO's I have played (those longer than 2 weeks) I had a tendancy to take my time exploring as much as I could before leaving.
I'm the person who will actually read the quest dialogue rather then the notes. In GW I would be the person who holds the group up watching the cutscenes while the white text says, 5/6 people wish to skip this video.

[Moloch]

EVE = sandbox. The recent Goonsquad / BoB shenanigans proving how successful a world with a player driven metagame can be.

WoW + War = scripted (also refered to as "carnivals").

Both are enjoyable in their own ways. Sandbox demands more of their playerbase.

[shadowfox]

Debates have erupted throughout the land of internets, as to whether or not online games ought to be sandbox or scripted. A little insight on what the two terms mean:
Sandbox: Open world, user generated content. The players can shape the world to their whim, although story does not have a strong grip.
ex. wurm online

Scripted: The players are guided by the storyline and quests to play the game. A disadvantage of a scripted game is limited content.
ex. Halo (single player campaign, but still scripted)

Some online games use both sandbox and pre-determined content. But which of the two should have a larger effect on the game?

I've played both types Sandbox and Themepark based games. And I know I'm very much a Sandbox person. But when it comes to your question about "which of the two should have a larger effect on the game?" I don't believe it boils down to which of the two as opposed to what was the original creator or creators goals when he envisioned the game he wanted to create.
My belief is, if a developer has in mind that he wants to make things as simple as possible and doesn't want to do a lot of objectives that he/she may consider tedious or more static and all he/she has to do is make simple changes to get the result they want then they may go themepark.

But if the developer may want their world and content to have dynamic changes within the world at any given point and they know they don't mind meeting alot of the challenges that will be faced in creating such a world, when making tools that give the player alot of choices that can affect the world they want to create they may choose sandbox.

But either way I believe it boils down to the creator and what they want, that will decide if a game will go either way or both.

This mostly my opinion from gaming over the years and looking back at alot of what developers go through to make the worlds they envision. Hopefully I explained it where you understand.

[reddo]

what you've said, shadowfox, is that the developers can do whatever they damn well please. I agree.

BUUT, I'm asking my fellow community members what they think is better for this game, sandbox oriented or script oriented. Apologies for any misconceptions you may have had.

[SnipingAngel]

In some places like in guild cities or something like that I would like to be it completly sandbox for the guild but not non guild members, and sandbox on a guild war map. But everywhere else i want to see it scripted but have several difrent choices to take at the same time. That way its never the same.

[shadowfox]

what you've said, shadowfox, is that the developers can do whatever they damn well please. I agree.

BUUT, I'm asking my fellow community members what they think is better for this game, sandbox oriented or script oriented. Apologies for any misconceptions you may have had.

For this game I would recommend sandbox.

[Rhiannon]

LoL I thought this was about the Mythic map Sandbox >.<

[SnipingAngel]

LOL You've been playing to much Halo 3 Rhi.

[fauzool]

EVE = sandbox. The recent Goonsquad / BoB shenanigans proving how successful a world with a player driven metagame can be.

WoW + War = scripted (also refered to as "carnivals").

Both are enjoyable in their own ways. Sandbox demands more of their playerbase.


You forgot Darkfall :P Which is a sandbox, but I think the game is dying now. It just has to many bugs and I don't think they should have launched it so early.