I too wouldn't mind a sand box.. btw the way you replied to Digby was rather rude and childlike xu... so i you lost alot of respect out of that.
Digby was right about HISTORICAL GAMES, being confined to a timeline. It would be rediculous having a historical game where you make historical advances, and have an end date that goes past the time period ? 200 years of advancement then nothing for everything beyond?
A sandbox mode is always fun, It would be nice to take your empire further or play around with your fleets. BUT it wouldn't make replay more fun, because lets face it you have an infinite amount of time to accomplish whatever, and what do you do when you control all of east indies ? Also if i can remind you sir, that they did say that it won't be a simple step of saving a ton of money and building a huge fleet, there are costs to growing too fat.
I wouldn't mind one, but the style of game they made there isn't any real BONUS, with sandbox i feel. I feel no loss for not having it in there, and i do understand economics i've done my uni courses too. They can always add Sandbox mode in a patch or somebody can even mod it in, they did give us that remember, and that is one of the biggest replay values for this gaming community.