Constructing role-playing game campaigns around sandbox-style play

Courtesy Penny Arcade.

Sandbox games have become all the rage in the computer role-playing game industry.  Basically, sandbox games use a game engine to create a living, breathing universe that has no proscribed means of navigating it – players can go wherever they like.  Non-player characters navigate this universe according to their own schedule – sleeping, eating, and working just like real life.

The downside this sort of game is that sometimes there's no clear guide as to what to do next.  Players who are accustomed to a more narrative style expect some nudge to fill in the blanks, and there are in fact some CRPGs who do provide clues (Fallout 3 being a prime example). But the program can't account for everything, and sometimes the player encounters boring parts of the game world – walking for hours in a desert might sound interesting in a book, but it's a big waste of time for a player.

What CRPGs need is a narrative voice that pushes the players when things get boring, and there's where tabletop RPGs can help. Ben Robbins shares his experience on his Ars Ludi blog, "Grand Experiments: West Marches." Ben's experiment differed from traditional story arc campaigns in three critical ways:

1. There was no regular time: Every session was scheduled by the players on the fly.
2. There was no regular party: Each game had different players drawn from a pool of around 10-14 people.
3. There was no regular plot: The players decided where to go and what to do.

Ben's goal was to engage passive players and let them drive the story instead of the other way around, as well as make a game that could be played at any time to suit the schedules of busy adults.

There are challenges in running this sort of game, one of them being that the Dungeon Master has to adapt quickly and proactively to changing conditions, often with little notice.  If players decide to venture off to explore an area the Dungeon Master had not previously mapped out, he has to map it out on the fly.

As a result, this sort of campaign also requires considerable preparation or shortcuts.  Good Dungeon Masters know how to do this and probably do it instinctively. Ben provides really helpful advice if you're willing to try this yourself. With nearly 200 responses, it's a popular topic.

Putting their own spin on the sandbox play concept is Gabe (of Tycho and Gabe, my friends from Penny Arcade). Of course, when Gabe does something, he does it big – multimedia, elaborate maps, random treasure generators, you name it, Gabe created it, built it, drew it, or wrote it. He created several subsystems to support this style of open adventure.

If you'd like to witness how a game like this unfolds and ask questions, see http://twitter.com/PADnD