sandbox/thempark and how it relates to swtor

Lots of great ideas and some not-so-great comments about the great ideas.

Suffice it to say I'm adding a "+1" to the Sand-Box theme request.

Whilst it is certainly hard to have a strong story line using sandbox features, it is definitely possible. Whilst SW:TOR currently has a strong story, it is very dull and very disconnected from the player. Like many others have said, it is almost like watching a movie. Its fun the first time, but you don't really feel part of it and you certainly dont have any control over the direction. No matter what choices you make during conversations, nothing changes.

Lets take Alderaan as an example. The main story line is House Organa vs House Thul, with influences from the Empire and Republic behind the scenes. The main story line should be kept relatively linear and "epic", like traditional story telling. Everything else could easily be more sandbox. All you need if for your interactions with the world to spark conversations, rather than conversations driving your interactions.

An example of this is exploration. Lets say im off exploring Alderaan and I find a hidden path in a mountain. Along the path I come across a hermit who, through conversation, fills in some more backstory of the conflict on Alderaan. In this way, it is the user that is driving the content and their level of interaction, but the story is still controlled by Bioware.

Another example: A village on alderaan is being attacked by the Thul. There are four possible states to the village: controlled by organa, defended by organa, controlled by thul, defended by thul. When you arrive, the village can be in any of these states. If it is currently held by thul, you can attack the village, clear out the thul, grab some loot. Organa would then move in and reward you for reclaiming their village. Then the Thul might attack. You can help defend (light side) or sabotage the defences (dark side). Your actions are driving the story and the consequences are semi-permanent. Your actions can trigger NPC conversations that fill in more story and provide rewards.

You still have the story, but the onus is on you to "create" the story. Alderaan is having a battle, sure, but your place in that battle would be determined by your actions, not by quests that tell you what to do. NPCs can still give you the cut scenes and conversations, but they would be a consequence of your actions, not the driver.

Quote: Originally Posted by Darth_Halford

It is actually the only way to tell a story in a traditional narrative fashion. I don't know what other games you've played over the years, but you can't have the kind of story that Bioware does and at the same time give the player ultimate control.

There's the difference between the story driving the content, and the content driving the story. Bioware has always been first and foremost about story driving content. Sure, your idea may be interesting and fun to certain people. You could even argue that one method of game design is always going to be "better" than another (which I say is an absolute impossibility). At the end of the day though, if you're trying to make the best story-driven game you can possibly make, you will never get there by using sandbox gameplay.

Honestly I don't think it would have been difficult to bolt SWTORs class story quest onto SWG.

I'm not saying it would have been the best of ideas, in the sense of the how best to merge the two games, but what I mean is that with a bit of imagination it is possible to blend the best of sandbox and themepark.

I think at this moment in time there are some people tripping on something. And that thing is expecting xp from anything and everything we do. We dont and not everything requires it.

Shingara as always made a good job. I support the idea. The game really in need of sandbox elements...

Elder Scrolls is also largely a case of content driving story, rather than story driving content. I think it would be an absolute tradgedy (as well as piss poor game design) to make a game that has so much story content involved, and than make it completly optional.

The rigidness of the plot is not that far of a deviance from the norm in Bioware games, particularly the last one. In ME3, the actual story followed a very rigid series of events with a sprinkling of diversions that helped build up the war effort. In the previous games, you were in control of which order you went in, but you still had to go do all of them sooner or later.

The reasoning why TOR doesn't act like those games, or KOTOR for that matter, is that we are dealing with a persistent online environment that multiple people are using at once.
They can't change the level of the mobs on a dynamic level like they did with KOTOR or ME without instancing or phasing EVERYTHING like Guild Wars and its sequel do.

I also can't think of any game that has told 8 completly different, fully voiced and animated narratives at the same time.

The problem with sandboxes is that you get covered in sand and then you can't get it out of your shoes.

With all the news that has come out and the f2p hitting since this topic was 1st created i was just wondering if peeps want to add based on the new information or even new player to the game who may not have seen this topic and wish to give there feelings on these thoughts.

The problem with sandbox MMO's, is that the vast majority of them fail. We, the customer, say we want sandbox but we rarely support them with our money.

Not entirely true. Name at least two sandbox games that are worth paying for. I can only think of one which is EVE online although gameplay is boring as hell there the rest of the sandbox is great.
What else do we have? Mortal Online? Hell, it is a disaster. Dark Fall? There's coming a sequel.

SWG was a great game .... and I also liked the jedi grind. I would love to have something like that again ...but I would also have some more depth like in EVE where you actually can lose all your stuff. Whyis this important? Because the fear of losing everything builds communities ...connects people. Face it guys, sandboxes have more community than a 10 mil subbers game like WoW. Sandbox is so much more MMO and themepark got rid of the massive aspect ...literally.