 |
 | |
| Developer(s) | Facepunch Studios |
|---|---|
| Written in | C++, C#, Razor, Sass |
| Engine |
|
| Platform | Windows |
| License | Proprietary software |
| Website | sbox |
S&box (stylized as s&box) is an upcoming game engine and platform developed by Facepunch Studios, intended to be a spiritual successor to Garry's Mod . It aims to surpass Garry's Mod rather than simply being a modern version of it. The platform is designed to allow users to create, share, and play a variety of games and experiences. [1]
In September 2015, Garry Newman, the creator of Garry's Mod, first mentioned that a sequel was in development. [2]
In September 2017, Facepunch Studios officially unveiled S&box as a prototype. This early version was built using the Unreal Engine 4 (UE4), incorporating a hotloading C# layer. The developers used UE4 for core features like rendering, networking, and physics. At this point, it was uncertain whether S&box would be released as a moddable platform or used internally by Facepunch. [3]
In March 2020, it was suggested that S&box was the Garry's Mod sequel. However, the project was put on hold while the team decided to switch engines, considering Source 2 or Unity. [4] The team eventually chose Source 2 by February 2021, the same engine used to create Half-Life: Alyx. This decision was made to make it easier to transfer tools from Garry's Mod and to update the engine with tools like ModelDoc and AnimGraph. [5]
By July 2021, a developer preview queue was established, granting access based on Garry's Mod and Half-Life: Alyx workshop activity. This allowed users to create custom game modes, maps, models, and Source Filmmaker projects. [6]
In July 2023, Facepunch introduced an invite system, distributing codes on Fridays to existing users based on their game usage. These codes were not Steam keys, and had to be entered on the asset.party (now sbox.game) website. This system was implemented to test the backend systems and to grow the user base. [7] However, a major shift in the development process occurred in August 2023. At this point, Facepunch undertook a significant retooling of S&box, moving away from the traditional Source engine's client/server architecture. The goal was to create a more flexible and intuitive development environment, and this involved replacing the entity system with a scene system similar to that used in Unity and Godot. They began using C# to control the engine, allowing greater control over the game loop. As a result of this retooling, new invites were paused, and old ones were expired. The developers focused internally on making the engine more flexible, aiming for an engine that would go beyond the Garry's Mod community. [8]
In July 2024, S&box opened for public preview access, allowing developers to test and provide feedback on various game modes and projects. Facepunch stated that they plan to make iterative improvements for the next few decades. [9] [10]
By November 2024, S&box launched its Steam page, [11] confirming the inclusion of an official sandbox mode. Facepunch has stated that S&box would not be released without it. [12]
S&box is described as a game engine and platform where users can create their own games. It is built on the Source 2 engine with a C# layer. The engine has a hotload system, which allows developers to see changes to their code take effect immediately without compiling or restarting the game. The platform features a scene system, similar to Godot and Unity, which allows for faster iteration, with everything being easily visible and accessible. [13]
It offers a range of tools, including Hammer for level creation, a terrain system for open worlds, ActionGraph for visual scripting, and ShaderGraph for creating shaders. S&box also supports virtual reality game creation and play. There is no need to install or subscribe to games or add-ons; users can simply click to play. [1]
S&box incorporates cloud-based assets, allowing creators to drag and drop assets into their scenes without manual downloading or subscribing. [14] In addition to the game creation tools, S&box features a benchmark system, allowing the developers to track performance and identify regressions. [9] The platform includes features for multiplayer, with multiplayer being built into the engine. [15]
The developers intend to allow users to export their creations as standalone games that can be sold on Steam and other platforms without licensing fees or royalties. The platform would feature a system that allows users to monetise their games, but it is being designed to avoid pay-to-win mechanics. [9]
Initial reception of S&box has been mixed, with some users expressing disappointment that it is not a direct sequel to Garry's Mod. [9]
In response to negative feedback regarding the default character model, known as "Sausage Men" or "Citizens", the developers decided to replace the model with a more generic humanoid character. This decision led to some backlash from users who appreciated the uniqueness of the original model, known as "Terry". Despite this controversy, many users have praised the engine for its ease of use and straightforward design. [9] [16]
The announcement of the official sandbox mode also received a positive response from users who expected the feature to be included. There is also a great deal of interest in the ability to export standalone games from the S&box engine. The developers have emphasised their commitment to the community and their intention to continue improving the platform, including further game jams open to all. [9] [12]
Valve Corporation, also known as Valve Software, is an American video game developer, publisher, and digital distribution company headquartered in Bellevue, Washington. It is the developer of the software distribution platform Steam and the game franchises Half-Life, Counter-Strike, Portal, Day of Defeat, Team Fortress, Left 4 Dead and Dota.
Source is a 3D game engine developed by Valve. It debuted as the successor to GoldSrc in 2004 with the releases of Half-Life: Source, Counter-Strike: Source, and Half-Life 2. Valve used Source in many of their games in the following years, including Team Fortress 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, Dota 2, and the Portal and Left 4 Dead franchises. Other notable third-party games using Source include most games in the Titanfall franchise, Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines, Dear Esther, The Stanley Parable and Garry’s Mod. Valve released incremental updates to the engine during its lifetime. Source was succeeded in 2015 by the release of Source 2.
Steam is a digital distribution service and storefront developed by Valve Corporation. It was launched as a software client in September 2003 to provide game updates automatically for Valve's games and expanded to distributing third-party titles in late 2005. Steam offers various features, such as game server matchmaking with Valve Anti-Cheat (VAC) measures, social networking, and game streaming services. The Steam client functions include update maintenance, cloud storage, and community features such as direct messaging, an in-game overlay, discussion forums, and a virtual collectable marketplace. The storefront also offers productivity software, game soundtracks, videos, and sells hardware made by Valve, such as the Index and Steam Deck.
A sandbox is a sandpit, a wide, shallow playground construction to hold sand, often made of wood or plastic.
A spiritual successor is a product or fictional work that is similar to, or directly inspired by, another previous product or work, but does not explicitly continue the product line or media franchise of its predecessor, and is thus only a successor "in spirit". Spiritual successors often have similar themes and styles to their preceding material, but are generally a distinct intellectual property.
Half-Life is a series of first-person shooter games created by Valve. The games combine shooting combat, puzzles and storytelling, and are played entirely from the first-person perspective.
A sandbox game is a video game with a gameplay element that provides players a great degree of creativity to interact with, usually without any predetermined goal, or with a goal that the players set for themselves. Such games may lack any objective, and are sometimes referred to as non-games or software toys. More often, sandbox games result from these creative elements being incorporated into other genres and allowing for emergent gameplay. Sandbox games are often associated with an open world concept which gives the players freedom of movement and progression in the game's world. The term "sandbox" derives from the nature of a sandbox that lets people create nearly anything they want within it.
Garry's Mod, commonly clipped as GMod, is a 2006 sandbox game developed by Facepunch Studios and published by Valve. The base game mode of Garry's Mod has no set objectives and provides the player with a world in which to freely manipulate objects. Other game modes, notably Trouble in Terrorist Town and Prop Hunt, are created by other developers as mods and are installed separately, by means such as the Steam Workshop. Garry's Mod was created by Garry Newman as a mod for Valve's Source game engine and released in December 2004, before being expanded into a standalone release that was published by Valve in November 2006. Ports of the original Windows version for Mac OS X and Linux followed in September 2010 and June 2013, respectively. As of September 2021, Garry's Mod has sold more than 20 million copies. A spiritual successor, S&box, has been in development since 2015.
Facepunch Studios Ltd is a British video game developer and publisher headquartered in Birmingham, England, founded in June 2004 and incorporated on 17 March 2009 by Garry Newman. The company is most known for its sandbox video game Garry's Mod and survival game Rust. Facepunch is currently developing S&box, which is regarded as a spiritual successor to Garry's Mod.
In the video game industry, digital distribution is the process of delivering video game content as digital information, without the exchange or purchase of new physical media such as ROM cartridges, magnetic storage, optical discs and flash memory cards. This process has existed since the early 1980s, but it was only with network advancements in bandwidth capabilities in the early 2000s that digital distribution became more prominent as a method of selling games. Currently, the process is dominated by online distribution over broadband Internet.
Source Filmmaker is a 3D computer graphics software tool published by Valve for creating animated films, which uses the Source game engine. Source Filmmaker has been used to create many community-based animated shorts for various Source games, such as Team Fortress 2, the Left 4 Dead series, and Half-Life 2.
Space Engineers is a voxel-based sandbox game, developed and published by Czech independent developer Keen Software House. In 2013, the initial developmental release of the game joined the Steam early access program. During the following years of active development, Space Engineers sold over one million units. In total as of 2024 the game has sold over 5 million copies In May 2015, for approximately a year and a half, the game's source code was officially available and maintained by KSH to assist the modding community. On December 15, 2016, the game entered Beta and was later officially released on February 28, 2019.
Rust is a multiplayer survival video game developed by Facepunch Studios. It was first released in early access in December 2013 and received its full release in February 2018. Rust is available on Windows and macOS. Console versions for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One developed in conjunction with Double Eleven were released in May 2021. Rust was initially created as a clone of DayZ, a popular mod for ARMA 2, with crafting elements akin to those in Minecraft.
Source 2 is a video game engine developed by Valve. The engine was announced in 2015 as the successor to the original Source engine, with the first game to use it, Dota 2, being ported from Source that same year. Other Valve games such as Artifact, Dota Underlords, Half-Life: Alyx, Counter-Strike 2, and Deadlock have been produced with the engine.
Call to Arms is a real-time tactics and strategy video game developed by German company Digitalmindsoft as the spiritual successor to the Men of War series. It was released in April 2018. A stand-alone expansion pack, titled Gates of Hell: Ostfront, was released in 2021.
Tower Unite is a 2016 virtual world party game and sandbox game developed by PixelTail Games, in active development and available as an early access title on Steam. The game is set on an island in the style of a resort theme park, where players can interact, play mini-games, and join lobbies via matchmaking. In addition, players can host public or private virtual spaces known as "condos", customized with furniture and props.
Teardown is a 2022 sandbox–puzzle video game developed and published by Tuxedo Labs. The game revolves around the owner of a financially stricken demolition company, who is caught undertaking a questionable job and becomes entangled between helping police investigations and taking on further dubious assignments. Teardown features levels made of destructible voxels, and the player follows the campaign through consecutive missions. In most missions, the player must collect or destroy objects connected to a security alarm that triggers a timer. The player has unlimited time to prepare and is given upgradable tools, vehicles, and explosives to create a path within the level that allows them to complete the objectives and reach a getaway vehicle before the timer runs out.
