The Sandbox Paradox

Minecraft: Bedrock Edition Screenshot.

During my recent years of "gaming freedom", I was able to experience and revisit many games with various genres. Having variety in certain aspects of your routine is nice as that not only helps you keep things interesting, but also allows you to discover something new or look at things differently. There's probably a lot I can say about prioritization of completionism, achievements themselves (already talked about that) and how changing your approach to games can really reinvigorate your desire to actively launch them again.

However, one topic in particular stood firm in my mind and it's about my experience with sandbox genre. In particular, with Minecraft and Terraria since I didn't really have much experience with other representatives of the genre... Nah, Stardew Valley is a farming simulator. I guess I should just get to it by stating that I'm terrible at sandbox titles and I find this fact to be pretty amusing for a number of reasons.

Conundrum.

This is bizarre largely due to nature of sandboxes. These types of titles are known for providing a lot of freedom to players, letting them enjoying the game in a way they wish to. You're free to go anywhere you want, do anything you desire in a way you see fit. People get to enjoy and fully express their creativity and preferred game style, which results in wonderful creations and some great time spent. Although the "creativity" aspect varies from each game and player's definition, sandboxes are beloved because they let and encourage people to enjoy the game in a way they want.

Which means that it should be relatively simple to define your own path after getting familiar with said games. In fact, I have no issues with something similar regarding other genres. Aside from my obvious gravitation towards completionism for achievements on Steam, there're also simpler things like taking your time in Stardew Valley and regularly using Mace of Contrition in Hexen: Beyond Heretic to duel Ettins and Centaurs. Despite all of this not being all that different from getting used to certain sandbox, eventually I end up hitting a dead end where I'm unable to make any substantial progress.

My first proper "block" occurred when I was playing Minecraft: Bedrock Edition somewhere around 2017. I'm pretty sure this was my first proper experience with the game aside from watching Minecraft YouTube videos for a long time, running around the demo versions of Bedrock on Android & Windows 10 and playing on my friends' device at school. It was awesome and I've achieved a lot of things at my own pace: from exploring many biomes in my world to defeating the Ender Dragon and raiding the End City with a ship for Elytra. This is when I first stopped and you can argue that it was a result of reaching the sense of completion by aforemention The End conquests. However, afterwards I didn't really jumped into the game for years and, when I did, I failed to reach as much progress as in that world. To me, that was a foreshadowing. Even if you may argue that it was just one of the reasons and I'm leaning towards agreeing with that.

I was able to recognize this paradox thanks to Terraria and I wasn't overly prepared to it in a same way I was with Minecraft. Since I haven't watched a lot of videos on YouTube and didn't learn elements of the game through other means, I didn't have anything except very short demo experience on Android to go of off. Despite this, I was able to learn and adapt to its gameplay and this resulted in me wasting many hours exploring the world, digging for resource and expanding my base for new residents to come in. Everything was great and I kept playing Terraria, but eventually I noticed that I've clearly stuck on one place... I remember it had something to do with not being able to get some material and a proper pickaxe (I think it might've been Molten one) for that. It's been a long time, I can't recall specifics and that wasn't the only wall on my way.

Similarly, I couldn't really defeat Eater of Worlds (got him in Journey Mode) & Brain of Cthulhu as I just didn't bother with building out proper arenas for those fights. At least that sounds like a solid explanation from the back of my head. I clearly didn't do a great enough job of just using Internet in moments when I needed. In fact, I haven't really bothered with that and instead chose to just hit my head against a wall for some time before moving Terraria to the side for different game or other type of activity at the time. That was the exact moment when I told myself "Hey, I'm really just bad at sandboxes".

Interpretation.

Now, what could be the reason for this? The first thing that comes to mind is perhaps me being overwhelmed with the amount of options games like Minecraft & Terraria present. After all, I'm pretty sure that's true for some people: you just have too much freedom, you struggle to pick a specific path and end up not taking any. Those players might prefer more linear experiences because of this and there's nothing wrong with that. Clearly, that's what happens to me, but where does it come from?

Most likely, it all goes back to my real life experiences. I'm pretty sure I already talked about my indecisiveness in some other posts, but really that's not all different from what I'm talking about here. If I have trouble with making decision in various aspects on my daily routine then obviously I'm bound to face that issue in gaming eventually. So that's just another reflection of it. As for the origins of aforementioned indecisiveness, well... Sometimes, you just don't have much freedom in your life and that would have an effect on you if this happens in the early years. This includes having a hard time managing received freedom because you weren't able to learn how to deal with it.

Honestly, I think this is one of the main reasons why Stardew Valley really clicked for me. Its day cycle serves as a good foundation for shorter game sessions as you can easily pick up the game, play 1-2 in-game days and put it down for today That's how I usually play Stardew Valley. Working on smaller daily goals as a part of grander design and I'm not getting overwhelmed by the latter or the sheer amount of content Stardew Valley has to offer as you learn to prioritize certain aspects of the game at the time very early on.

Because of that, I think (and hope) that all of my Stardew Valley experience would end up improving my attitude and focus in Minecraft, Terraria and potentially other sandbox titles I end up playing in the future. Or any other type of game with a huge degree of freedom in its gameplay and/or systems. As always, only time will tell.

Conclusion.

You know, it's very interesting to think about how one's personal experiences shape our preferences in gaming. While it doesn't seem all that interesting at first glance since that's not exactly a novel idea, what makes it curious is how nuanced it can be. And by that I mean how even the slightest things could change the way we play certain titles in very drastic and/no subtle ways. Perhaps you avoid drinking any alcohol due to your intolerance of it in real life, More obvious example is picking good/neutral/bad dialogue options based on your personal view on specific character, situation and/or in-game world.

As I'm writing down this final part of the text, I do acknowledge that this could be a weird thing to get suddenly fascinated by. In some ways, it most likely is. I'm not even going to try and push the "it's all about the little things" card. That would feel kind of cheap and too obvious. Instead, I would stick to my usual nonsensical final words and those would be... Uh-h-h... Let me think... Okay. Some of our decisions, preferences and struggles in specific games might seem insignificant and random at the first glance, but there's a likely chance that they're a result of a major part of your life experience. Yeah, that sums it up.