discussion Who plays Sandbox Games?

[User_174965]

You underestimate how many shitty VNs there are. There are far more garbage VNs than bad sandbox games. RenPy simplified making VNs so much that it allowed a very large amount of slop to get made. Most VNs are not even games. They are just glorified gallery viewers. Clicking skip text to get to the next scene is not gameplay.

I agree there are far more Shitty VNs out there. Even far more garbage VNs than Sandbox games but that's because of the sheer amount of VNs. The rise of A.I hasn't help in this regard.
I still absolutely prefer VNs to Sandbox games every day of the week though, given the negatives of Sandbox games.

I will also admit that newer VNs in alot of cases have felt like gallery viewers. But at least even then, you aren't wasting hours grinding to get a decent jack-off session going as long as the gallery viewers have decent renders / scenes.

 

[User_88762]

I agree there are far more Shitty VNs out there. Even far more garbage VNs than Sandbox games but that's because of the sheer amount of VNs. The rise of A.I hasn't help in this regard.
I still absolutely prefer VNs to Sandbox games every day of the week though, given the negatives of Sandbox games.

I will also admit that newer VNs in alot of cases have felt like gallery viewers. But at least even then, you aren't wasting hours grinding to get a decent jack-off session going as long as the gallery viewers have decent renders / scenes.

Care to tell which sandbox games you find awful enough to turn you away from the whole genre? Or is it more of a time constraint. Because VNs are generally far less time consuming than, games in general.

 

[User_174965]

Care to tell which sandbox games you find awful enough to turn you away from the whole genre? Or is it more of a time constraint. Because VNs are generally far less time consuming than, games in general.

Well, its just that many sandbox games just have this grind feel to them like okay, click here 10 times before you can move on type thing. When I've experienced it so many times, it just gets to the point that, 'is this game even worth the effort'?
It seems to me these days that every time i find a sandbox game, I get this feeling either, 'why couldn't this have been a VN?' or 'i just wasted an hour and haven't had either alot of progress or very little progress'. Its designed to be tedious. Go here x hour at x day. Then do that 5 times before the next new event! Ugh.

But to answer your question as to certain sandbox games that have driven me crazy . . .

1. Really bad grindy games
   1. Tangled Up is one. Hell there was a second game out of that as well now that i think of it. Yeah, terrible!
   2. Lust and Power is another good Example of alot of time wasted there.
   3. I semi remember Live in Corruption being grindy.
   4. Alot of the HTML based ones are some of the worst.
2. Decent Games with some grind factor that can get annoying
   1. Simple Days is an example of a decent SandBox game but the grind of doing the same things with so many different women / how to make progress in that game can be annoying.
   2. summertime Saga (before the 'Enhanced milking crap),
3. Even games that aren't THAT bad, like just have that, 'you can only do x thing on this day so go through the cycle of week and come back' concept.
   1. Demon Boy Saga
   2. Take Over
   3. Others like it such as Glassix have that 'sandbox' 'trainer' like vibe to them.
   4. A Town Uncovered while good has that issue too.

Bad Bobby Saga is also one of those games that would have absolutely benefited from NOT being a Sandbox game.
Also, in thinking of really good game i have played off hand, I don't think any one of them would be Sandbox games. Being a Dik, Haley's Story, My Sister My Roommate, Broken Dreamers, College Kings, Oath of Loyalty, Waifu Academy, Become a Rockstar, Sisterly Lust, Halfway House, Family Man, Mid Life Crisis, Family Affair, Friends in Need etc etc. I would prefer to play ANY of those before a Sandbox game. Though Desert Stalker is more of a VN then a Sandbox, and note - Summertime Saga is one of the exceptions of a decent SandBox that wasn't terrible despite a little grind and had alot of good sex scenes. Lust Theory is really good too with its groundhogs day vibe when you remove the Ads and well before Season 2 too.

 

[User_88762]

Well, its just that many sandbox games just have this grind feel to them like okay, click here 10 times before you can move on type thing. When I've experienced it so many times, it just gets to the point that, 'is this game even worth the effort'?
It seems to me these days that every time i find a sandbox game, I get this feeling either, 'why couldn't this have been a VN?' or 'i just wasted an hour and haven't had either alot of progress or very little progress'. Its designed to be tedious. Go here x hour at x day. Then do that 5 times before the next new event! Ugh.

But to answer your question as to certain sandbox games that have driven me crazy . . .

1. Really bad grindy games
   1. Tangled Up is one. Hell there was a second game out of that as well now that i think of it. Yeah, terrible!
   2. Lust and Power is another good Example of alot of time wasted there.
   3. I semi remember Live in Corruption being grindy.
   4. Alot of the HTML based ones are some of the worst.
2. Decent Games with some grind factor that can get annoying
   1. Simple Days is an example of a decent SandBox game but the grind of doing the same things with so many different women / how to make progress in that game can be annoying.
   2. summertime Saga (before the 'Enhanced milking crap),
3. Even games that aren't THAT bad, like just have that, 'you can only do x thing on this day so go through the cycle of week and come back' concept.
   1. Demon Boy Saga
   2. Take Over
   3. Others like it such as Glassix have that 'sandbox' 'trainer' like vibe to them.
   4. A Town Uncovered while good has that issue too.

Bad Bobby Saga is also one of those games that would have absolutely benefited from NOT being a Sandbox game.
Also, in thinking of really good game i have played off hand, I don't think any one of them would be Sandbox games. Being a Dik, Haley's Story, My Sister My Roommate, Broken Dreamers, College Kings, Oath of Loyalty, Waifu Academy, Become a Rockstar, Sisterly Lust, Halfway House, Family Man, Mid Life Crisis, Family Affair, Friends in Need etc etc. I would prefer to play ANY of those before a Sandbox game. Though Desert Stalker is more of a VN then a Sandbox, and note - Summertime Saga is one of the exceptions of a decent SandBox that wasn't terrible despite a little grind and had alot of good sex scenes. Lust Theory is really good too with its groundhogs day vibe when you remove the Ads and well before Season 2 too.

I guess it is matter of taste then. I personally enjoy some grind if there is a result accompanying it. I also really enjoy optimizing my grind so it adds some fun to the whole process. I have not played any of the sandbox games you mentioned except Glassix, though I probably played with worse grind like Superpowered.

One of my first porn games was Slave Maker which is essentially a sandbox trainer and I loved these type of games ever since. Porn Empire, Peasant Quest, A Struggle with Sin, Harem Collector, Whoremaster, Sold Girl Town. Just to name a few.

 

[rocketsheep]

You underestimate how many shitty VNs there are. There are far more garbage VNs than bad sandbox games. RenPy simplified making VNs so much that it allowed a very large amount of slop to get made. Most VNs are not even games. They are just glorified gallery viewers. Clicking skip text to get to the next scene is not gameplay.

I don't think that I underestimate the number of shitty VNs. I have a humongous collection of games I have tried, even after filtering out almost everything that is not based on Ren'Py and over 50% of what is based on Ren'Py. The Ren'Py games I filter out are mostly VNs (because they dominate numerically) with very unappealing graphics or concentrating on disgusting fetishes.

Sometimes I don't like the story but like (some of) the graphics. Then I just pick the images/videos I like and throw away the rest. Sometimes I find the graphics relatively boring but read a VN for its story alone. This happens far more often than enjoying a sandbox game for the gameplay.

I am not picky when it comes to language and style. While I prefer it if a game is not in Engrish and has no typos, I can tolerate these problems so long as I understand what the author is trying to say and can autocorrect them in my mind. When I play a VN for the story, it is for the plot, not the language. I also enjoy watching fan episodes of Star Trek almost as much as real episodes. That's probably related.

Sometimes I even positively enjoy visual novels that are a mess in every respect, such as The Lécuyer Cult. It has Honey Select graphics, but of unusually poor quality. It has a very weird plot with no clear direction. It is supposedly complete, but it can't have a proper ending, as I don't remember it and actually thought it was abandoned. Much of the text seems poorly translated from Spanish. And yet: It transports me into a truly wonderful and in some ways very appealing setting. The randomness of the plot is even an advantage, as it means I can replay this once a year, and it still feels fresh. And some (very few) erotic scenes are very appealing.

 

[dclore]

I think it is less that you hate sandbox smut games and more that you hate poorly implemented mechanics.
VNs are the easiest set of game mechanics to implement, just a static/animated image with a text box and choose-your-own-adventure input, so even poorly done VNs are fairly decent.

Bad survival game mechanics are harder to implement than good VN mechanics, and making the survival element fun is even more challenging still. I'm not writing them off without trying though.

 

[Boberson1234]

Honestly sandbox is my favorite genre! Its more fun to "discovery and earn" it when playing a game

 

[Beegee]

if you had to recommend one game with resource management what would it be?
or is there any game with these mechanics that you keep coming back to?

Games that I keep coming back to:
Lab Rats 2: Reformulate
Free Cities (Pregmod)

Used to really like Superpowered, but it feels a bit unfinished, and the guy's new projects are too obtuse and grind-tastic even for me.

 

[Kitten]

they can be done well, but its rare and an rpg format is better suited to what most devs make i think

 

[Mageborn]

Not a fan of sandbox. Personally, feel like most sandbox sucks and just adds useless elements to the game.

 

[Carnagie]

Most sandboxes bring nothing to the table. The point of a porn game, generally, is to have hot scenes with a decent story, yes? Most grinding and timelocks actively hurt that. Having to cycle through different locations just drags things out.

I'm not saying they're impossible to do well, because BaDIK does exactly that. The sandbox moments break up a flood of scenes, if you tried to have all of them without some space in between the game would barely be giving you any time to breath.

So it can be done, but most devs don't have the right kind of skill and the right kind of games to make it happen.

 

[Nezron]

Sure as long as the sandbox is like desert stalker or something then hell yeah.

I actually think Desert Stalker would be better as just a VN without the sandbox. Just give some choices on who you want to mess with (like the raider girls). But I like it anyway... it just makes you click on rooms and locations to get the story and girls. And I think that is my issue with sandbox games.... you just have to click on a bunch of shit or repeat events just to get things moving.

 

[juront40]

I actually prefer Sandbox over VNs. Its probably the game aspect, you have to kinda "earn" the porn.
I'm okay with playing and grinding a bit, emphasis on bit, to get what I came for. With VNs it's more like a crtl simulator for me.
Most of the time the story isn't that engaging and my brain is too fried to read all that text without any other stimuli.

 

[Nezron]

I started with sandbox games and did have fun with a lot of them, but they tend to be grindy. Like I am currently playing Sweet Affection.... and building up the stats on the girls is very grindy, and since a lot of the events for girls take place at the same time of day.... then you either skip to next day or grind out events of other girls and try to remember to do the event the next day..... and it takes a long time to get to any sex. And even though it has lots of girls... no harem tag... sad

Anyway, now days I really prefer just VN's like Cosy Cafe, or The Fiery Scion. I also like games like Ripples, Twisted Memories etc...

But I do not like games like A House in the Rift.... it has nice looking characters.... but I hate games that make you navigate houses....

peace

 

[User_111574]

When it comes to GAMES specifically, VNs can be classified as games with a stretch, while KNs have nothing to do with games at all. In fact, only RPGs and various types of sandbox games can claim to be games.
But whether or not a project is successful in the end, it depends entirely on the developer.

 

[User_176898]

I only really enjoy "Sandbox" games if there's some sort of corruption, with choices. If there's not choices, I get bored pretty quick.

 

[rgd]

Well, I like them, they make me feel free in the sense that I can do things in different ways or choose who to start with and in some cases if I don't like a character I can choose to ignore them and so on.

 

[vixifairy]

i love sandbox games. especially if it has forms of ai. that shit can get chaotic. which in turn means lots of needless fun. even adult sandbox games are neat. though i havent actually seen very many of these. i need to do a bit more digging.

 

[EEacidEE]

Love sandbox cuz game shoud be game at first. Always need to do something in game and not just watch/read

 

[Captain Panda]

i love sandbox games. especially if it has forms of ai. that shit can get chaotic. which in turn means lots of needless fun. even adult sandbox games are neat. though i havent actually seen very many of these. i need to do a bit more digging.

Just wait intil InZoi gets it's ai integration and the modding tools are released