The Sandbox: Hand of God

Of creating worlds. Maybe we’re in one too, created by some superior being — who knows

The Sandbox, on iOS, is not an open world sandbox game, rather it gives you the opportunity to create a world or two (or three), depending on how much time you want to devote to creationist purposes. Similar in principle to Minecraft, the objective is to build a world in a 2D screen, learning to use different elements, how to combine them and how they interact with different kinds of weather. Lava turns sand to stone, burnt remains of trees under pressure turn into oil and acid dissolves rock. It’s like a fun, elemental version of rock-paper-scissors with an added dimension of climatic conditions thrown in the fray.

There are two versions of the game: a story mode and a free mode, the latter permitting the player to create (and destroy) anything they please. The story mode levels give the player certain objectives, which usually consist of completing or altering certain pre-fabricated structures or landforms, sometimes by using a specified element. Each level then unlocks new elements which players can buy by using mana points which they earn by completing new elements. This makes it a chicken-and-egg situation; you can’t complete some levels because you don’t have enough mana to buy the element required, and you can’t get enough mana without finishing the level. For those familiar with the realm of touch mobile games, this prompts the user to buy mana point in-game. However, all is not lost, at least, not to those who are patient. Good things come to those who wait. . . and tap

away obsessively.