We already shared with you a list of tips and tricks for The Sandbox Evolution, but since we couldn’t simply stop with a set of tips that mainly focused on mana, we’ve got another one for you below. But first, let’s take a look at what this game is all about, just in case you’re learning about it for the first time. The Sandbox Evolution is a game from Pixowl that follows up on the original Sandbox title, putting you in charge of more than 170 elements and controllable heroes. The title lets you create your own games and levels, while sharing them online, and allows you to create and destroy at will, as you are, after all, playing God. You can even compose your own music and create your own clipart in this game, should you be feeling extra-creative.
Now, that we’re done with the beginner tips, we’re going to talk you through the more advanced facets of this game. So join us for our second The Sandbox Evolution strategy guide, as we talk about some of the finer details of playing this game, including the very things that allow you to play a god, at least in the mobile world of your creation.
1. Don’t Skim Through The Tutorial
We probably should have told you about this the first time around, but it would be a good idea to pay close attention to the Genesis campaign. As the title suggests, this is your first campaign, and your introduction to the game. It serves as a tutorial of sorts, and walks you through the fundamentals of the game, including using elements and unlocking new ones, and how different elements interact with each other.
2. More About The Caveman Campaign
We talked about the Caveman campaign in brief in our beginner’s guide, but to fill you in on a few more details, this is a campaign that serves as your introduction to platforming. You can even use the things you learn in this campaign when creating your own levels, and when it comes to the club that your character wields, you can use it to break certain materials. That’s going to help you move forward in the levels, while also reaching areas that are otherwise hidden.
3. How To Fight With Your Caveman Club
When using your club to kill animals, you may need to be a bit patient with some of the larger animals, such as bears and sabertooth tigers. Sure, they’re big and ferocious animals that are a threat to any caveman, but if you tap on the club button quickly and repeatedly, you’ll find that killing these animals is second nature.
Then again, you wouldn’t always have to resort to violence in order to complete a level. In fact, killing enemies is often optional when trying to complete levels in the Caveman campaign. You may have to resort to a non-violent, peaceful solution to get around things; it may require you platforming your way to another route, or bouncing on top of the enemies, instead of slaughtering them with your club.
4. How Does Sandmix Differ From The Caveman Campaign?
Sandmix, we’d say, is a combination of the words “sandbox” (as in this game’s title) and “mix.” That’s because it bears a strong resemblance to the Caveman campaign, but doesn’t require you to use any character in specific. You could play this campaign if you want to check out user-created levels from the Sandbox Evolution community, get some ideas for your own creations, and improve your platforming skills while using the playable character of your choice.
5. Hit The Pause Button In Sandbox If The Game Isn’t Cooperating With You
Just because you’re playing God doesn’t mean it’s always going to be easy creating new stuff. In the Sandbox, you can create anything and everything possible with what you’ve got, as you form your own items and experiment with the elements you have available at your disposal. However, there will be times when the game will purposely make it hard for you to create new things, with temperature, physics, and other variables convoluting it all for you. What’s to do in this case?
Fortunately, the answer is very simple – all you have to do is hit the Pause button on the top portion of your screen. This would temporarily switch off the temperature, physics, and all the other crazy variables, so that you can focus on fine-tuning your creations right down to the last pixel. You can always hit the Pause button again to resume the interactions once you’ve perfected whatever you’re working on.
6. How To Manipulate The Sandbox Menus
The temperature can play tricks on you while you’re creating in Sandbox, but the game lets you experiment on it as well, letting you change the time of day, humidity levels, and the temperature itself. You’ll also have a chance to change the background image if you wish, and once Pixowl releases the texture packs, you can test them out in Sandbox as well. Practically everything is available to tweak in Sandbox, so keep playing around and don’t give up if things don’t work well for you in the first try.
7. Creating Your Own Levels
If you want to actually create platforming levels you can share to the community, you’ll want to go to the Make Game section, where you can start with a stock level and riff off of it, or start everything from square one, effectively working on a blank canvas, so to say. The elements are conveniently sorted so that you can go to a specific area and access what has to be accessed; for example, all the basics are located near the back, while enemies, obstacles, and the like can be found near the front. Tap and hold on your character’s image so you can test the level out and play it out like a regular player would. Though you can always make your levels quite difficult, so as to test other players’ mettle, you might want to make sure your level isn’t impossible to play!
8. Other Creative Aspects Of The Game In A Nutshell
You can go to the Pixelart section to create your own, well, pixel art. As you’ve got a handy paint tool, as well as a background grid, it’s best to create your artworks here, as opposed to the other game modes. And in the Music section, you can create chiptune compositions of your own; it’s possible to use Piano Note elements and Music Blocks to create your own songs, and use the elements of metal and electric current to “power” your compositions. Just remember that it could often be a challenge to control the pace of your tunes; it’s all about proper spacing in between notes, though it could take a lot of trial and error to master the Music mode.
9. What Should You Buy If You Want To Spend Real-Life Money?
As we explained in our first guide, mana is the main currency in The Sandbox Evolution, while karma is the premium currency. And while the in-app store allows you to buy either currency with real-life money, it would be better to spend on element packs. This is going to give you more value for your hard-earned dough, as you’ll be unlocking in-game items with real money, as opposed to spending in-game resources to do the same. Of course, it would be better and more cost-effective to just play the game and let everything unlock as you go along, but if you’ve got more cash than patience, element packs are the way to go.
10. What Can You Spend Your Karma On?
Karma is much harder to earn than mana, which means you’re really going to have to make it last long, even if some elements can only be permanently unlocked with the premium currency. As such, you’ll want to save up on that karma and use it only when you really have to, which is to unlock an element that you’ll be using quite often while playing the game, or to unlock campaigns that you know are going to be productive for you.
11. Be A Good Community Member
Last, but not the least, we should inform you of this tip as some gamers have reported sneaky activity within the Sandbox Evolution community. While this tip won’t help you in playing the game, it will help you in being a good citizen online – you can play other people’s levels, but make sure you do not change anything on that level, and make doubly sure that you show some respect and don’t do what others have done, which is to vandalize other players’ pixel art.
If you really want to edit someone else’s created level, tap on the World menu while viewing that level, and select the Clone option, so you can save a copy onto your game and do the edits from there, without affecting the original creation.