Sandbox is only a genre. It cannot be the "future of gaming", although I'm willing to bet that it will become a very common element in games in coming years.

I sure hope not. I'd like to think the sandbox genre/aspect of certain games should make a game special. If most/all games had it, it'd become boring and monotonous and just plain blah.

I like my games to have variety in gameplay thank you very much.

I believe there's room for both, but are gamers, specifically "newer" gamers and those in a certain age demographic ready for them?

By newer I mean those gamers that have or are coming into gaming now or since the hue online explosion of late 2005 when Xbox 360's Live Experience was really pushed. It hearled in a huge rise in gamers coming not only to the 360, but to gaming in general.

With it can a new breed of gamer. Those with little patience, small attention spans, little or no commonsense or ability to simply try new things and see them for what they are. Yes, I know I'm generalizing, but most older or longer standing gamers will understand what I mean - hopefully.

Look at games like, Far Cry 2, Mirrors Edge, or any game that requires some level of thought, persistence and yes, time in order to not only master it, but see the game through.

Games such as these, and there's many others too numerious to list, receive the condemnation of many new-gamers with the most overused statement of all being, that the games are "boring, repetative and just plain dumb.

Yet they have probably given the game all of a few hours play and then hopped on the various forums or blogs and dissed the game no end, and if they see a review at lower than 8.5/10, they believe their thoughts on the game are warranted , as any good game has to have a 9 or above to even warrant discussing.

Now if sandbox game play did coming into the fore, then they would not really do all that well. Even if the audience demanded the style. It's sort of a catch 22 situation.

The gamers want innovation, they want free roaming and they want new IP's and not sequels, yet they diss the games that have those things in spades, and chose to buy the sequels by the truckload . . go figure.

I believe we need linear games, and at the same time, some level of open game play where needed. Otherwise, the developers that have a strong storyline can not have that game play out as intended if it had 100% destructiblity, free roaming and open worlds. It would be a mess. And those 3-6 yrs of work would go down the toilet.

Some games are absolutely begging for free roam, sandbox style gaming but some games simply don't need it. *cough FarCry 2 *cough

There's definitely room for both. Free roam is fun but making elements linear can mean a much more polished and well rounded experience. As soon as you introduce freedom into any game situation it makes it a lot harder to be compelling.

I don't think that the genre is the 'future of gaming', as not everyone likes games like GTA and Crackdown. But I do think that the genre will improve in the the years to come.

I think it depends right now sandbox needs to get rid of the stigma of being a GTA online routine. Hopefully the new games like inFamous, Prototype and Alan Wake will change that as right now GTA like crime games are the only way we fully get a half decent sandbox experience. I think sandbox gaming will have to evolve as if all we are going to get is crime game after crime game like GTA then sandbox is just going to grow tiresome and boring, hopefully some developers are really pushing it now with the whole superhero/antihero concept in sandbox.

My question is, do you think the new-comer to gaming, and the "instant gratification" generation will allow such games to flourish . .?

Without their purchasing power, as new-comer purchasing power is significant, will developers continue to even consider developing open worlds where you have a large amount of opportunity, Fable II, etc or will they go for the quick-buck trash stuff, as money keeps people in work . . . not innovation.

Since 2005 the new-comer gamer has basically overtaken many areas of gaming, so much so that many old staple games are now facing extinction in favour of the quick-kill style games.

Ad heavy puzzles, stratergy, forward thinking etc into a game and you run the risk of having many newer gamers simply not even picking up. AT their expense of course. As they miss out on a great experience . . .

SO what do you think . . ?

This may be controversial, but I think the sandbox genre is losing popularity. With the GTA games on PS2 it was unique, original, and above all else, great fun. But it's been copied and cloned so many times now that virtually every game features some elements of sandbox gameplay.

I think that the interesting thing about next-gen is that when developers focus their attention on a particular gameplay style (Metal Gear Solid 4, LittleBigPlanet, Gears Of War 2 etc.), the effect is much more impressive, and seems a bigger leap from the last-gen. However, with sandbox games, it just seems like last-gen with a bigger map and a lick of paint. The jack-of-all-trades attitude of sandbox games doesn't allow the sort of spectacular, focused gameplay that we see in other titles - and that's what people want from the next-generation.

I really like sandbox games, but I dont want every game to be one. Like whats the point in trying to shove a sandbox game with a racing game?

The same goes with shooting games...

Sandbox games are the future in my opinion. All games should have a wider set of choices in them.

I'm all for bigger games. I tend to invest a lot of time in my games so I figure there are not that many games that can last as long as I would like. That's why I'm glad there are developers like Bethesda or BioWare for making games like those. I believe that they come in small doses and it takes YEARS to develop games like those, so I'm not worried that it will overtake and somehow ruin video games.