The 23 Best Sandbox Games - The first knowledge sharing application in Vietnam

The sandbox genre covers dozens of different games. Here’s our list of the best titles you can enjoy on console and PC.

Determining the greatest sandbox games is no easy feat as it’s an enormous genre that covers dozens, if not more, of the most popular games available right now.

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From the blocky creative goodness of Minecraft to the ever-expanding ways to play Grand Theft Auto Online, a sandbox game is any game that puts most of the control in the player’s hands. Play how you want. Find your own path. Here are the best ones that are available to play right now, on both PC and console.

Updated December 7, 2022 By Ben Jessey: The average gamer appreciates choice. They like having the ability to decide how or what they do at almost all times. In fact, these days, games that are more restrictive in what you can do are often criticized.

Modern-day gamers like to have a bit of control over their games. This is why the sandbox genre is so popular. These titles give you nothing but options to tailor your own experience. We put some of the best examples on this list. And now we’ve added a few more.

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Stardew Valley

At the beginning of Stardew Valley, you acquire a house and a piece of land that belonged to your grandfather. It’s not in a great state, so you’re encouraged to fix it up. Beyond that, there are no true goals or objectives. You are free to live your farmer life how you see fit.

Some of the things you can do include interacting with nearby NPCs, exploring caves, going fishing, completing various quests, or simply continually improving your farm. It’s all a chill and stress-free experience.

Animal Crossing: New Horizons

Animal Crossing: New Horizons is a life simulation game, but it likely doesn’t represent your actual life. That is unless you live on a deserted island with a bunch of anthropomorphic neighbors.

There are plenty of things to do on the island, such as building up your relationships with your animal-like buddies and collecting resources. You’re also free to decorate your home with items you find or buy, making it feel like home. Plus, you can take part in any seasonal events that crop up. So, there is quite a range of activities, and you can decide which ones you do.

Hitman

2016’s Hitman is a unique kind of sandbox game. After all, each mission does have a goal – usually to kill someone. Yet, you’re allowed to complete your objective in any way you desire.

For instance, do you want to disguise yourself as a supermodel and walk the runway to get close enough to your target to poison her before slipping away unnoticed? Or do you just want to shoot her in the head? The decision is up to you, but that’s just two options – there are almost an unlimited number of other ways to take her out. This is because each level is a sandbox filled with so many opportunities.

Astroneer

In Astroneer, you’re dumped on a planet with a spacesuit and a deform tool. The rest is pretty much up to you. But you’re encouraged to dig and explore the mysterious planet to gather resources.

With the materials you find, you can build different things to improve your new life in space. You can even craft a rocket and travel to other planets to check them out. And you don’t have to do it all alone as you can bring some buddies along for the ride.

Garry’s Mod

Garry’s Mod (aka GMod) has been around for a long time. In fact, it’s one of the most iconic sandbox experiences in gaming history. The game gives you access to all sorts of assets, and you can do what you want with them. The most creative players have managed to make some extremely cool things, such as popular games like Trouble In Terrorist Town and Prop Hunt.

What you can make from it depends on your level of creativity and the amount of free time you have. But the game gives you all the tools you require to do great things.

The Sims 4

The Sims is one of the most famous video game series of all time. And they’re a perfect example of enjoyable sandbox titles. In Sims 4, you are allowed to live the life you want. You get to fully customize your family and house – as long as you have enough in-game money in the latter’s case.

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Then you get to decide how your Sims live the lives you’ve given them. To add to the fun, there is a litany of wonderful DLC and mods for you to install.

Core Keeper

Core Keeper is one of 2022’s breakout indie hits. The aim of the game is to dig, dig, and dig some more. A cooperative exploration, survival, and mining game for up to eight players, Core Keeper is inspired by games like Stardew Valley, Terraria, and Minecraft.

There are unique monsters to battle, farms to build, and bits of gear to upgrade. It’s a title that has continuously improved since its early access release. So, it’s a great time to jump in and see what all the hype is about.

Dyson Sphere Program

One of the sleeper indie hits from the start of 2021, Dyson Sphere Program is a wonderfully complex factory-builder in the likes of Factorio.

The planet is your sandbox. There are conveyor belts, item-feeders, aerial transportation…this a game you can easily sink hundreds of hours into if it gets your hooks in you. If you love games like Factorio or building item-sorters in Minecraft, you should check out Dyson Sphere Program.

Minecraft

Minecraft is undoubtedly one of the greatest sandbox games of this generation. Its development has spanned a decade, seen its ups and downs, to be sure, and provided a platform for thousands of creators to experiment, play, and entertain.

It has changed a lot over the years, as the developers have made many additions to the game, like the amazing Caves and Cliffs update. Throughout it all, the title has never strived away from its core concept: to give you almost unlimited freedom to create whatever you want in its blocky world.

Terraria

Much like Minecraft, Terraria is a classic. One of the best-value deals in gaming. Ever. It could cost you just a couple of dollars and for that, you’d get easily over a thousand hours of content, painstakingly added by a dedicated development team over the course of a decade. For free.

Terraria is the ultimate sandbox. There are thousands of items, monsters, bosses, and a complex modding scene that will keep the game alive for many years to come.

Grand Theft Auto Online

While the constant re-releases of GTA 5 and GTA Online have received plenty of criticism, it’s hard to deny the quality of either. GTA Online, in particular, is an outstanding sandbox experience.

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Being able to freely roam around Los Santos remains a delight. Not to mention, the almost endless amount of content Rockstar has provided for the multiplayer game means it’s easy to keep playing this title for years. There’s still no other multiplayer game quite like this, which is likely why it continues to maintain its immense popularity.

Elite Dangerous

Pick your poison: space simulators are still massively popular, and Elite Dangerous provides one of the more intoxicating sandbox experiences if you can look past the endless grind. Any game that allows players to kidnap new players and blast them off to the other side of space, then force them to mine resources until they’re allowed back to the tutorial section, grabs attention.

Those kidnappers were deservedly banned, but the story proves what sort of experience Elite Dangerous is. It’s a fantastic space sandbox where you can do just about whatever you want.

No Man’s Sky

After a truly terrible launch, maybe one of the worst game launches in the history of game launches, No Man’s Sky has been redeemed by a series of free updates that are usually well thought out and of very high quality.

Hello Games didn’t give up on their project. Didn’t jet off to some Pleasant planet and build a base there. Nope. They knuckled down and turned No Man’s Sky into one of the largest and most intricate sandbox games out there. Not bad.

Cities: Skylines

After the iconic fall of Sim City, Cities: Skylines took up the mantle of best city builder and delivered. It’s the ultimate city-building sandbox, especially if you splash out on its dozens of DLC packs.

Want to build a city where you create an enormous dam of sewage water and then flood your city with it? Well, you can, if you want to. Alternatively, you can mod the game to a state that is almost unrecognizable from the base game.

Crusader Kings 3

It’s not difficult imagining putting several thousand hours into Crusader Kings 3. After the long support of Crusader Kings 2, the predecessor is more new-player friendly (yes, really, the UI is terrifying but easier to learn than ever before) and very enjoyable.

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The game is a complete medieval sandbox, where you can start as the count of a tiny French province and eventually rule the world, leading your nation on crusades and establishing your own religion.

Factorio

A game that spent four years in early access, Factorio is probably one of the most polished and complete construction management games ever released. It is complicated but in all the best ways.

You can spend hours and hours arranging your conveyor belts, feeding factories and engines, and manufacturing materials to expand your factory. It’s a never-ending cycle, and wow, does it feel good to be efficient.

Scrap Mechanic

Scrap Mechanic is self-described as a “creative paradise.” And it’s hard to come up with a better phrase to describe one of the best sandbox games out there.

The main aim is to design fantastical vehicles and other machines, but there’s more to the title than that. The game also has its fair share of monster battling, discovery, and exploration. Plus, in 2020, a full-fledged survival mode was added to the title to make things even more interesting.

Going Medieval

An early-access indie breakout in 2021, Going Medieval is a colony simulator that has some of the best building mechanics we’ve seen in a game like this, sort of becoming a 3D Dwarf Fortress with multiple building layers. Huge towers, deep cellars, that sort of thing.

It’s not just about building, though. You also have to look after your settlers. So, you must keep them happy and, more importantly, keep them alive. If the elements or starvation don’t get them, then raiders might.

RimWorld

When discussing great sandbox games, RimWorld should always come up. There is no other game that lets you run an organ-harvesting operation from a base on a distant planet, surrounded by ice and angry raiders.

The premise alone makes this title stand out in a crowded genre. But the sheer amount of freedom you’re given to tailor the experience you want is another reason why RimWorld is a classic. It has some fantastic mods and DLC, too.

Rust

Oh, Rust. Beset with problems pretty much all the time (the performance on consoles is still pretty awful), it makes very little difference to the popularity of this game. This sandbox survival game is best played with friends or a rogue solo mission into the chaos of a busy server.

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Build, survive, and interact with potentially over a hundred different players, the weekly server resets always make the game feel fresh, even if grinding out every week becomes, well, a bit of a grind.