Most DETAILED SANDBOX you've ever played.

For me i cant think of anything with more detailed world interaction than CRYSIS. In terms of destructiblilty, no arbitrary restrictions without ingame context (there are sharks in the waters and boats that will blow you up if you swim to far out, but NO invisible walls) and interactivity (you cant pick up everythingthat someone in a super suit should be able to pick up, even indivitual pieces of items you have destroyed, like chunks of trees, broken box pieces, wildlife and all manner of pots and pans) Crysis is the best ive seen. and lets not even get started with detail in the visuals themselves

also you can pick up turtles, frogs etc and shoot down indiviual seagulls from the sky. awesome!

sure, it doesnt have the scope of oblivion or fallout but in terms of detail i think the sandbox levels in crysis are pretty unmatched.

What about you guys? im sure there is something out their ive missed or havent played.

GTA4 has probably the most detailed open-world game I've ever played. Just Cause 2 had a lot of copy and paste but was a lot of fun to explore.

There really aren't a lot of open world PC exclusives that have really detailed worlds.

GTA: VC and GTA: SA, of course what else

Both of which are actually in the top 10 PC here on gamespot as I post this lmao

GTAIV was an awful sandbox. There was nothing to do!

GTA IV hands down, nothing comes even close, it's so dense on detail and I personally never saw two places that look the same, large, unique, highly detailed world.DanielDust

lol, you guys are trolling right?

Just Cause 2 was a ton of fun for me.

The GTA series just never appealed to me that much.

GTA4 without a shadow of a doubt.

Okay, I know you guys are probably trolling here, but I want to clear some things up.

GTA IV is not a sandbox game. It's an open world action game, and a pretty limited one at that. Your interaction with the world involves driving cars and killing pedestrians, neither of which has any lasting effect on the game world. The only real decision is whether you want to drive a car and kill pedestrians here, or do it 3 blocks over, or on the other side of the bridge. Saints Row 2 was more of a sandbox than GTAIV, and it's not a sandbox either.

Dwarf Fortress without a doubt. There is a lot of interactivty with the world, and lots of details to learn as well as mechanics. It is one of the most complex games I have ever played. It is difficult to learn, but once you learn it, it gets a lot of fun.

The runner ups are Ultima 7 and Aurora.

[QUOTE="DanielDust"]GTA IV hands down, nothing comes even close, it's so dense on detail and I personally never saw two places that look the same, large, unique, highly detailed world.xLittlekillx

lol, you guys are trolling right?

[QUOTE="xLittlekillx"]

[QUOTE="DanielDust"]GTA IV hands down, nothing comes even close, it's so dense on detail and I personally never saw two places that look the same, large, unique, highly detailed world.DanielDust

lol, you guys are trolling right?

Yes I did. It almost held my interest through the whole story, but cousin roman made me ragequit and go to multiplayer until I realized there was nothing to do.

X3 and the Space Engine program

Just to correct, any and all GTA's are sandbox - the genre is the in fact the godfather of sandbox

However GTA: IV is easily the worst GTA

I had a pretty kick ass sandbox out back when I was little that my Dad built. It was pretty detailed and my plastic Army Men enjoyed the many tour of duties they had there.xXDrPainXx

Garry's Mod.

Well I liked GTA IV as it was if it could have used some additional contacnt but I wouldnt have liked it if it was turned in to a sims game, Also it is the most detailed world made in a game(at least sandbox category).

[QUOTE="DanielDust"]GTA IV hands down, nothing comes even close, it's so dense on detail and I personally never saw two places that look the same, large, unique, highly detailed world.xLittlekillx

lol, you guys are trolling right?

[QUOTE="xLittlekillx"]

[QUOTE="DanielDust"]GTA IV hands down, nothing comes even close, it's so dense on detail and I personally never saw two places that look the same, large, unique, highly detailed world.jettpack

lol, you guys are trolling right?

I can see 60 cars at a time in GTA IV;pft, barely has any cars, if it'd be 61 now that would be something.

[QUOTE="xLittlekillx"]

[QUOTE="DanielDust"]GTA IV hands down, nothing comes even close, it's so dense on detail and I personally never saw two places that look the same, large, unique, highly detailed world.jettpack

lol, you guys are trolling right?

[QUOTE="jettpack"]

[QUOTE="xLittlekillx"]

lol, you guys are trolling right?

DanielDust

I can see 60 cars at a time in GTA IV;pft, barely has any cars, if it'd be 61 now that would be something.

anyway, the topic is about the most DETAILED sandbox, not the biggest in scope. GTA 4's liberty city fell flat for me. Sure it was big and has a lot of cars and npcs, but the ways in which you can interact with the city is pretty limited. you can kill people and do some mini games and thats pretty much it. Liberty city feels empty despite being full of NPCs and cars and whatnot. Its wide but its not dense or rich in terms of interactivity.

Crysis springs to mind, but I think Just Cause 2 takes it here. It's such a huge game, where you can go literally anywhere you can see, such varied environments, dense forests, cities, its just massive and theres so much going on. Even the macro detail is pretty incredible, its a beautiful game.lucfonzy

Minecraftdarkfox101

Yeah, this. Also, terraria, mount & blade warband, SPAZ (kinda), far cry 2, space engine, project zomboid, ARMA 2, STALKER etc.

They're all good, but have different "sandboxy" type of gameplay elements.

Minecraft, and to think that its all randomly generated. Gotta love that perlin noise :P

X3 Terran conflict.. As far as I am concerned most of the ones mentioned in here I could hardly qaulify as a real sandbox.sSubZerOo

Yeah, I just got into X3 and am really liking it... except that I never have much time to play.

[QUOTE="DanielDust"]

[QUOTE="jettpack"]yeah, i agree. it felt pretty empty for new york city.

jettpack

I can see 60 cars at a time in GTA IV;pft, barely has any cars, if it'd be 61 now that would be something.

anyway, the topic is about the most DETAILED sandbox, not the biggest in scope. GTA 4's liberty city fell flat for me. Sure it was big and has a lot of cars and npcs, but the ways in which you can interact with the city is pretty limited. you can kill people and do some mini games and thats pretty much it. Liberty city feels empty despite being full of NPCs and cars and whatnot. Its wide but its not dense or rich in terms of interactivity.

[QUOTE="jettpack"]

[QUOTE="DanielDust"] You can't find a game that comes even close when it comes to number of random NPCs, is it anything you guys are doing here regarding GTA that is not about something irrelevant that doesn't make sense anyway?

I can see 60 cars at a time in GTA IV;pft, barely has any cars, if it'd be 61 now that would be something.

DanielDust

anyway, the topic is about the most DETAILED sandbox, not the biggest in scope. GTA 4's liberty city fell flat for me. Sure it was big and has a lot of cars and npcs, but the ways in which you can interact with the city is pretty limited. you can kill people and do some mini games and thats pretty much it. Liberty city feels empty despite being full of NPCs and cars and whatnot. Its wide but its not dense or rich in terms of interactivity.

In Crysis sandbox mode you can do whatever you want. You can create 50 soldiers and surround them with explosive barrels and try to jump the explosion in a buggy.

You guys are sad if you think Crysis and GTA IV are the most detailed sandbox games you've ever played.

Hop into ArmA 2 and tell me that it's not a detailed sandbox. You can do anything you want with the mission editor. The map is designed with 100% real geographical data (of course scaled a bit). Even the towns on the ingame map are in very similar design to the towns in real life in that location.

I have to say Minecraft. As much as I like JC2, Minecraft IS a better sandbox, as you can do ANYTHING in it.

GTA IV like most others said

GTA 4 !

[QUOTE="xLittlekillx"]

[QUOTE="DanielDust"]GTA IV hands down, nothing comes even close, it's so dense on detail and I personally never saw two places that look the same, large, unique, highly detailed world.jettpack

lol, you guys are trolling right?

It wasn't new york city.

Here's an example of Space Engine in action and why it's the most detailed Sandbox IMO.

This is zooming in without loading screens, by the way.

Every star you see in the milky way there is really there and rendered, as well as all plnets around them. Every planet has an atomsphere, weather, hills, valleys, mountains, oceans....and on very rare cases, you might find some life!

It really depends if you just talking about the world or the gameplay. GTA4 looks great and has a very alive feeling, but the fact that you can't go in 99% of the buildings and can't interact with 99% of the NPC's (other than shooting them) really makes it shallow. Hands down the most complete true sandbox game would be Gary's Mod as you can literally make almost anything with it. Other great ones are X3 TR and ArmA 2 (this has a great editor). Most people who don't know what a sandbox is will say GTA4, but those games aren't true sandbox games at all.Croag821

That's why I was shocked when so many people started answering with GTA4. As PC gamers, I figured most people here would be more familiar with the variety of stuff out there, instead of the ultra generic open world console port that took 2 years to optimize to playability on PC.

If we are talking RPGs, then Gothic 3 might be on this list. If you are looking for an absolutely massive gameworld with tons of stuff to do and ways to interact and use most items in the game (and there are a ton of them), then this is the game for you. Shallow quests and what some would call quirky combat, but with all the patches this game is really a gem.

X3: Terran Conflict is the most detailed sandbox without a doubt. Anyone who has played it can attest to that.

Most "detailed" sandbox game or most entertaining sandbox game? that's a big difference, best sandbox game I've played on PC is RF:G, the physcis engine is out of this world, GTAIV and prototype come close to second. but best over all sandbox game in my list, without question -> RDR.

BTW, crysis is not a sandbox game, but a FPS with sandbox elements, just so you know.

[QUOTE="jettpack"]

[QUOTE="xLittlekillx"]

lol, you guys are trolling right?

realguitarhero5

yeah, and then totally overwelm the AI