by Matt Kellogg -

What about sandboxes?

I found it interesting that sandbox style games were not mentioned in any of the articles about “not games”. I understand that sandbox style games are not walking simulators, but from my understanding they are also not games. During discussions of games in other classes and outside of classes it’s always been the case that games were defined as having a goal whereas toys were defined as not having a goal but supporting emergent goals and having interesting interactions.

Walking simulators are interesting in that they give the player the ability to explore and find the secrets and the intentions left behind in the environmental style stories by the creators. I would go as far as to say that some sandbox style games allow the player to create their own stories. And while not everyone’s story is not amazing, both sides of the creation and consumption dynamic can be fun if the player is given the correct amount of agency.

Expanding on this, I think at a higher level this is the core dynamic of all interactive stories. The creator decides on (or is restricted to by time or money) some amount of agency to give the player, and the player gets to experience the story in some bound determined by the agency given. Higher agency tends to yield less cohesive stories, and less agency tends to yield more cohesive and complex stories, but with less interaction.