Need to rant a little about sandbox avns

[kazeiheikaya]

The main thing that I need to scream into the void about: Dear god people who make AVN's with a sandbox feature please, just please stop doing this one simple thing thats probably been said 10,000 times already.

If you have a section where there is only ONE CLICKABLE POINT ON THE SCREEN AFTER A SCENE TRANSITION, DO NOT MAKE THE PLAYER/READER CLICK THAT ONE SINGULAR POINT, JUST TRANSITION INTO THE NEXT SCENE!!!

I cannot for the life of me understand why devs do this. Is it not just painstakingly more work to code in clickable scene transitions than just having a natural transition? I see this happen in roughly 4/5 of every sandboxes I go through. I cannot rationalize it to save my life lol.

also please stop making sandbox just to have sections to find hidden renders exclusively, extra workload alone should deter people but for whatever reason they still do it. Idk who likes that but I havent come across anyone with positive feedback for that either lol. Seen several titles that add hidden renders as scenes progress without needing any sandbox elements too.

Theres been a sudden flood of sandbox lately and it seems to follow the same formula. No combat, No minigames, Nothing special, just usually hidden renders or click to continue story.

 

[anne O'nymous]

Theres been a sudden flood of sandbox lately and it seems to follow the same formula. No combat, No minigames, Nothing special, just usually hidden renders or click to continue story.

Er... The "sudden flood" was already here in 2020.

As for the rest, as annoyed I am by free roaming mechanism that have only one possible destination, at least they offer a consistent story. What is too often not the case for the ones that offer more than one option, since they, too often, forget to correctly synchronize the story.

 

[kazeiheikaya]

Er... The "sudden flood" was already here in 2020.

As for the rest, as annoyed I am by free roaming mechanism that have only one possible destination, at least they offer a consistent story. What is too often not the case for the ones that offer more than one option, since they, too often, forget to correctly synchronize the story.

I've not been here that long can only speak from when I started here till today heh.

But yes Sequence Breaks are also a massive pet peeve of mine "hey here's this character you NEVER met yet, but since you didnt go in a specific order unknown to you, you already have a pre-established relation with the unfamiliar face that hasnt been introduced"

 

[Count Morado]

Theres been a sudden flood of sandbox lately

Don't make me create a table.
You wouldn't like me when I create a table.

 

[kazeiheikaya]

Don't make me create a table.
You wouldn't like me when I create a table.

Honestly I probably would cause I'm an awful nerd like that too.

 

[morphnet]

The main thing that I need to scream into the void about: Dear god people who make AVN's with a sandbox feature please, just please stop doing this one simple thing thats probably been said 10,000 times already.

If you have a section where there is only ONE CLICKABLE POINT ON THE SCREEN AFTER A SCENE TRANSITION, DO NOT MAKE THE PLAYER/READER CLICK THAT ONE SINGULAR POINT, JUST TRANSITION INTO THE NEXT SCENE!!!

I cannot for the life of me understand why devs do this. Is it not just painstakingly more work to code in clickable scene transitions than just having a natural transition? I see this happen in roughly 4/5 of every sandboxes I go through. I cannot rationalize it to save my life lol.

While it is understandable, there are 4 reasons I have read about for it being done this way, although there could be many more.

1) Build anticipation, "oh look a library I wonder what will happen there." "oh there's a beach hope there's lots of topless women" I'm looking forward to when that location opens.

2) Introduce mechanics, e.g. Man of the house does this. You can walk, take a taxi or take the train, each has it's own cost and can help you when saving money or meeting people at a certain time but the first time you have to walk and you also find out that by traveling you can open new locations and find new information.

3) Because some players feel the exact opposite to you and have complained "why call it a sandbox if I can't choose where to go" even when there is only 1 destination.

4) encounters / events and not to waste the players time. During the day open map, at night only downtown bar is available. As the story progresses more locations open downtown at night but the player doesn't waste time trying to visit the school at night when there is no events there.

This is not to say these are the reasons or only reasons for ALL dev's doing it and there could be many more. Also in most sandbox games I've played there is a story "time" and a free roam "time". A good example

https://f95zone.to/threads/starmaker-story-v1-5c-arvus-games.218071/

also please stop making sandbox just to have sections to find hidden renders exclusively, extra workload alone should deter people but for whatever reason they still do it.

They do it because there are people who enjoy looking for hidden items / content / easter eggs and not just in porn games.

Seen several titles that add hidden renders as scenes progress without needing any sandbox elements too.

True but do you want all title using the exact same mechanics all the time in all the games? Plus there are people who enjoy hidden objects / items / content / easter eggs.

Theres been a sudden flood of sandbox lately and it seems to follow the same formula. No combat, No minigames, Nothing special, just usually hidden renders or click to continue story.

This has been covered by others but even if you are new-ish here, going to latest updates and searching will show it's not sudden, it's not a flood and there are many many sandbox games that do have minigames, combat, special mechanics etc. you just haven't found / played them yet.

https://f95zone.to/sam/latest_alpha/#/cat=games/page=1/tags=2257

Overall there aren't as many games using single location multiple times throughout the game, many of those single locations open / expand to new locations / events. Hidden items / content is there for those who enjoy it, if players don't like the idea they can skip it and there isn't a sudden flood, it's been pretty steady and many use widely different and varying mechanics and styles.

 

[c3p0]

Er... The "sudden flood" was already here in 2020.

Only that recently? Man I'm getting old.
Also Jaike:

 

[anne O'nymous]

Man I'm getting old.

Me too... So the date have to be took with caution due to my legendary accurate memory... As legendary as Sasquatch...

 

[Goeffel]

Me too... So the date have to be took with caution due to my legendary accurate memory... As legendary as Sasquatch...

oh, learned sth. new.

an association I did not get, when in Basquash! the mechas they use for their destructive mecha-street-basketball are called bigfoots (which they really are)

aaand now I am infected again, need to listen to the soundtrack for a while. or maybe even watch the whole thing again. again.

 

[anne O'nymous]

oh, learned sth. new.

Well, glad that, for once, my self-mockery humour served to something

 

[kazeiheikaya]

it's not a flood and there are many many sandbox games that do have minigames, combat, special mechanics etc. you just haven't found / played them yet.

have definitely played these, and I agree with alot of what you said, I'm just mainly pointing out the games that transition to one screen with one clickable.

like quoted from myself here " If you have a section where there is only ONE CLICKABLE POINT ON THE SCREEN AFTER A SCENE TRANSITION, DO NOT MAKE THE PLAYER/READER CLICK THAT ONE SINGULAR POINT, JUST TRANSITION INTO THE NEXT SCENE!!! "

meaning you literally go to the next screen, as in the devs place you there, theres nothing new, nothing changed, and just one clickable person you have to talk to. One singular point, No location change, No free roam, Nada, just a click to next objective. You are also locked to that screen, so theres nothing to even look for, or menu over, its just a halt in progress of story transition.

If you just transitioned to a new scene, it would be more logical because you're just stopping the player from continuing unless they interact with that one singular point, instead of just continuing onto the next scene.

As far as the hidden render easter hunt go, I just personally never seen any positive feedback on it, more negative than anything, and mainly talking about when its in a VN that only introduces that as a specific feature to their entire sandbox section, instead of a section where theres other elements and the hidden renders placed along with them. So the sandbox only exists due to said hidden images. (ie: a mostly kinetic novel that only has yes or no choices, but adds a sandbox element to just easter egg hunt, and nothing else, no influence on the story, no combat, no hidden animations or scenes, or characters to talk to, just hidden images heh)

Thanks for humoring my rant tho yall, just got to me

 

[Gunizz]

The problem with "sandbox" VNs is that they require more planning and efforts to make them right, and most developers aren't able to make them in the right way. So the grinding and excess of mouse clicks happens. It's quite easy to mess the gameplay of a sandbox VN.

Hidden content is a trending plague that affects many VNs and it seems it won't go away soon. I refer to the clickable minuscule random objects that are hidden in a scene and the player is supposed to move randomly the mouse at each screen to find them. That's mental.

 

[Insomnimaniac Games]

meaning you literally go to the next screen, as in the devs place you there, theres nothing new, nothing changed, and just one clickable person you have to talk to. One singular point, No location change, No free roam, Nada, just a click to next objective. You are also locked to that screen, so theres nothing to even look for, or menu over, its just a halt in progress of story transition.

If you just transitioned to a new scene, it would be more logical because you're just stopping the player from continuing unless they interact with that one singular point, instead of just continuing onto the next scene.

I can see it in those games that think they're being clever with esoteric navigation (they're not, please stop doing that). Basically a "tutorial" that you can click that and something happens. But that's the only place I can think of where it'd make sense.

 

[peterppp]

meaning you literally go to the next screen, as in the devs place you there, theres nothing new, nothing changed, and just one clickable person you have to talk to. One singular point, No location change, No free roam, Nada, just a click to next objective. You are also locked to that screen, so theres nothing to even look for, or menu over, its just a halt in progress of story transition.

devs can use a button to display information. like "open the door" will tell you what action you will take. then it becomes part of the story telling. and even if there is only one button to click, clicking on "open the door" can provide a subtle feeling of agency compared to just click-click-click anywhere on the screen.

 

[anne O'nymous]

devs can use a button to display information. like "open the door" will tell you what action you will take. then it becomes part of the story telling. and even if there is only one button to click, clicking on "open the door" can provide a subtle feeling of agency compared to just click-click-click anywhere on the screen.

Oh god, I really hate those one option menus even more than having to click on the only door to open it. It's like free roaming where only one destination matters, you don't need to have this at all.

 

[Winterfire]

If you have a section where there is only ONE CLICKABLE POINT ON THE SCREEN AFTER A SCENE TRANSITION, DO NOT MAKE THE PLAYER/READER CLICK THAT ONE SINGULAR POINT, JUST TRANSITION INTO THE NEXT SCENE!!!

Since I don't think anyone answered your main question, I will:
This happens due to the fact that the dev needs to break the flow between a scene and another, I did the same things in a few of my games.
Even a pure Visual Novel will often break the flow from a scene to another, but it'll be done differently since by its nature, reading will still be involved. The "Break" is still in the context of the Visual Novel, meaning it's a narrative break.

In a sandbox (or other non pure Visual Novels), breaks are done for another purpose, which is to let the player do side content or get the requirements to play the next scene.
I'll take two projects of mine as an example: In Overlord H, I had those breaks to allow people to interact with the heroines and get Hentai scenes with them before they moved on with the story (ignoring characters they weren't interested in), whereas in Legacy of Hestia, you could use the break to train your stats in the Dungeon, buy equipment, or do side content before moving on with the story.

If you say there's really nothing to do, you probably either missed it or you're over-exagerating.
Even if that was actually true, the content is likely missing for now (games is in development), you didn't meet the requirements (for example you didn't reach love 10 with heroine x), or whatever other thing you can do depending on the game.

All in all, breaks exist in every game. Except some very rare and specific cases such as Infinite runners, flappy bird, etc. with a continuous flow.

 

[Infamyxxx]

This happens due to the fact that the dev needs to break the flow between a scene and another

Agreed. Transition hetween scenes is very important. That's why Ren'Py provides so many in-built transitions like Dissolve and Fade for characters as well as backgrounds because an instantaneous transition can be very disconcerting to the player. Any game is supposed to give the agency of control to the player even if there is only one option to transition to the next scene.

Now, if the game is filled with such transitions only where the player is presented with only one option everywhere, then that's a matter of a tedious game design.

 

[kazeiheikaya]

If you say there's really nothing to do, you probably either missed it or you're over-exagerating.

It's kind of a trust me bro because I dont want to shame anything publicly rather just rant about the concept than shame a dev. Hell I even love the game personally but i assure you, did several methods that find anything hidden on a screen lol. You could be correct in there wasn't anything added yet, even though that chapter was done and moved on from. But yeah, definitely wasn't anywhere to go, anywhere to move, anything to click. After spending 5 minutes on that screen I made this post in frustration because it wasn't the first time I ran into it, and honestly doubt it'll be the last Will also add, it was just background NPC's and a maincast of characters that you were meant to talk to, it was out of place so to speak. Granted I'm ignorant to the thought process but as a reader it was the equivalent of a having an adblock on and a skippable commercial break appears right before a moment of action in a movie. You just kind of scratch your head like "wait, why?"

The transition itself would have been fine which is what i was getting at, but you cant auto, or skip through (if thats how you go about it), gotta actually continue it manually, and click the one specific point on the screen.

Now, if the game is filled with such transitions only where the player is presented with only one option everywhere, then that's a matter of a tedious game design.

Yeah, I feel that, thats mainly the ones with hidden renders that do that, that i ranted about prior. Scene ends, free roam begins, only one render available among 30~ish rooms, go find it, or click singular point to continue story heh.

 

[Winterfire]

I don't mean fading or other transitions. That's visual.
I mean more tangible breaks, in a pure visual novel, imagine having a heavy drama scene lasting for hours... It would be mentally draining, or humor scene lasting for hours... That would get annoying fast. All of that, including sex scenes, need a break to keep everything balanced and feel good to read/play.

 

[kazeiheikaya]

Sandbox and dating sims is originally what I came to f95 for. Used Itch originally when I first found out about it, and then I found out about f95 through one of the itch devs so I came here (unironically think it was caribdis). Dating sim where you work attributes and manage things, etc was one of the first things I ever played, people say about getting old, I'll throw an old ass reference out, first time I experienced that was a simple flash game on Newgrounds called Ganguro Girl. Man, that and the McDonalds simulator game made me a total sucker for management/dating sim style games. Regular video games starting pushing romance out alot less too, so I wanted a bit of that passion in a video game, alot of my favorite games tend to have some form of relationship building (ie: witcher, dragon age, mass effects, etc)

Fast forward to today and welp, I think I strongly prefer a kinetic novel now. I still constantly check out sandbox trying to find a good sandbox game. Honestly even considered playing Overlord H but I'm a bit weird with R34'ing some characters I really like (cough, Albedo) havent crossed that line into full degeneracy yet.

Think Heads will Roll was probably the best sandbox VN I found so far, but sadly its not an animated VN or really has any lewd content. Theres a handful of other good ones but out of more than I'd care to admit, I'd say I end up dropping about 80-90% of them. Either incredibly tedious grinding, solely hidden render hunts, constant sequence breaks, or constant A->B repeating cycles.

Just my opinion either way, Not saying all sandbox are bad or guilty of these things, but I've definitely come across alot that are just strange in design decisions. Like you said an hour of constant chatter in a sandbox wouldn't make sense, but a 3 minute scene give or take into a single point transition, stuff like that is just odd to me heh.