The Sandbox of God: Remastered

Sandbox games are usually created in order to give you as many options as possible when it comes to choosing the preferred course of action, so that you get the feeling that your decision matters. While some titles express this free will option by letting you roam the streets of an entire city, other games took the concept even further, as is the case with The Sandbox of God: Remastered, which happens to be subject of this review as well.

The purpose of the game is to take certain actions in the right order and combine their effects, so that everything falls into place accordingly. However, being God is pretty difficult, which means that things won't work out the way you planned sometimes and disasters are bound to happen sooner or later. Thus, while unleashing a horde or furry bunnies into the forest might sound like a good and harmless idea, the fact that they devastate everything they touch quickly makes things very difficult for you.

As such, it is of capital importance that you use each divine power when the time is right, even if it may seem destructive to do so. Hence, an earthquake might be perceived as violent and devastating, but the cracks it leaves behind can be later filled with water, in order to create rivers and provide the people with fresh water. Speaking of which, you also have to keep an eye on your human population after you create them, as well as their IQ level, since the end goal is to help them advance as much as possible over the course of the game.

When it comes to the gameplay mechanics, everything takes place in turns, which means that you only get to perform one action per turn. More and more actions become available as you advance, but they also depend on your score and you may not be able to utilize some of them. However, while this does offer the game an increased level of replayability, it can also backfire, since you can quickly lock yourself out of most actions and just skip through the turns without too much you can do.

There are multiple eras you must go through, all of which expand the number of available actions and provide your people with the chance to evolve. At the end of each era, your score is calculated and you are given a certain rating, depending on how you chose to handle the situation and how much fire and blood was necessary to keep the population under control.

In the end, The Sandbox of God: Remastered truly achieves its purpose and lets you make a lot of choices throughout the game. Moreover, since you cannot witness every course of action in one go, multiple replays are almost required, which should provide you with plenty of gameplay hours.