You can do that just fine in VN form, without the unnecessary 10-20 extra clicks to move from rooms, map locations and clicking items.
>Pick go to LI A as a choice.
>Exit your room, move through the living, move to the hallway, exit house, click phone, open map, click LI A location.
I wonder which one is preferable and less annoying. Don't even get me started on the constant bugs every renpy sandbox has. Sandbox is just a convenient excuse of adding dev time, with nothing substantial to show for it.
And the 'Open world' and 'You chose where to go' is just a myth, since you need to grind stats/money/items so eventually everything is kinetic, the order means squat, if the only way to move the story is by doing all of them eventually.