7dtd hasn't really been a sandbox once alpha 17 hit, its gotten more and more linear with more and more sandbox elements slowly being removed each alpha. 2.0 now removes the biome exploration if you don't turn off the biome progression as your forced to deal with it otherwise. Thankfully TFP did something smart for once and allows you to disable biome progression, I hope that always stays an option as there is currently no real reason for the biome progression to exist as there is no reason to go to other biomes really.
More linear but still very clearly a sandbox game still IMO.
@Kyoji Minimal restriction? I mean yeah, that´s kind of true, nothing stops you from trying, but in many games you listed, going in those areas very early in game, will simply kill you pretty fast and you will get nothing from it. In 7 days you could cheese it and still survive and get what you wanted from there. Good luck trying to get an artifact in ARK on day one or even just getting near it. Or going into the volcano in Conan. Sure you can try, but other than death you will get nothing from it.
Not sure what your vision is for the progression system or whether you like it in its current state. I think the progression system should reward progression. Keep in mind you can still cheese it with smoothies if your definition of that is simply collecting loot from a higher loot stage due to the biome bonus.
The difference from what I gather is you prefer more of a hard cap on progress while I prefer a soft cap on exploration.
As a very rough example, instead of forcing DoT damage in the biomes simply tie loot stage to be more in line with day/week progress.
So instead of a flat bonus to loot stage it scales with the current day/week to where the bonus the Wasteland gives in week 1 will be much lower compared to week 2 and subsequently week 3 until you get to whatever week. The burnt forest could open up after day 7 and offer it's full bonus value and the desert after day 14. The wasteland during each example would still give a better loot stage but more marginally so.
This puts more emphasis on progression and going through the biomes than the current iteration which is speeding through the biomes until you get to wasteland as it's easy to be wasteland ready before the third horde night which makes the burnt forest, desert and snow biome after thoughts.
This also allows people to play in whatever biome they want, albeit with their own set of challenges from storms, temperature fluctuations, radiation poisoning over longer exposures, etc.
I am ok with this only because progression can be turned off and because if you want proper progression then do that. You spend a few days max in the burnt forest until you can skip ahead.
Also loot cap should be removed after you beat the game (whether that is after the wasteland badge or after beating the Duke content in the future).
handed to me, I won't complain, I'm happy. Even if never ever done in any other game, it ain't wrong to allow it. The loot will suck just a little less as the stuff in the T1/D1, so the rewards aren't worth it.. so the only reason to go in is the challenge.
