Best Games That Let You Become God

Plenty of games offer the power fantasy dream, where you play an unstoppable (or almost unstoppable) force and are turned loose in a game world to wreak havoc. Lots of those games nail this feeling, and gamers flock to them because it’s a feeling that’s all but inaccessible in real life. However, what happens when a game takes things one step further?

In these next games, you aren’t just playing a power fantasy; you’re playing so that you can eventually become a god. We’re covering two types of games here, since this could appeal to different sets of gamers. Some of these titles let you strive towards becoming a god and eventually achieve it, while others are from a genre known as “god games,” where you play as a god and must use your divine powers to help those who worship you.

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Pathfinder: Wrath Of The Righteous

Multiple Paths To Godhood

You might not start out as a god in Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, but there are plenty of opportunities to turn your character into one by the game’s climax. As a CRPG, WotR is all about character builds and narrative choices, and both play a part in your quest to achieve divinity. You might even be able to get a few companions to join you in the pantheon.

Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous contains a slew of available “mythic paths” (hence the game’s title), and almost all of them lead to celestial power of some kind. However, to ascend to true godhood, you need to progress through the game and achieve the secret ending, literally called “Ascension.” It’s a long and complicated process, but as long as you aren’t following the “Legend” or “Swarm-that-Walks” mythic paths, you can attain true godhood.

Okami

Restore Nature As The Sun Goddess

At the other end of the spectrum, Okami starts you playing as the sun goddess Okami Ameterasu, who appears in the form of a white wolf. After the demon Orochi escapes his prison and curses the land of Nippon, Amaterasu and the artist Issun must restore its former glory through the use of the Celestial Brush.

Using the Celestial Brush brings the game to a pause, allowing you to draw on enemies or the environment in various ways by either moving the left analog stick, using motion controls, or waving your Wiimote or PlayStation Move wand if you’re freaky like that. By doing this, Amaterasu will gradually restore Nippon to its former glory and drive out Orochi and all other demons along with him. It’s not quite the level of all-powerful godhood that some players might be looking for, but Okami is still a classic that every gamer should experience at least once.

Divinity: Original Sin 2

It’s Right There In The Title

Much like Pathfinder: Wrath of the Righteous, some endings in Divinity: Original Sin 2 do lead your character towards godhood. The difference is that becoming the Divine (aka a god) is the primary focus of the main quest throughout the game, rather than a secret alternate option unlocked through meticulous roleplay. The twist is that your entire party is technically suited to become the Divine, but only one of you can claim the mantle.

As such, the drama is less about how you will become a god and more about how you will convince your companions that it should be you who ascends, and not one of them. Or, maybe you think it should be one of them. That works too. While it’s not a traditional CRPG, with a lot of tactics and turn-based combat (instead of the genre’s “real-time with pause” standard), there is still plenty of opportunity for you to influence the story in ways both expected and unexpected. That should come as no surprise. After all, Divinity: Original Sin 2 was developed by Larian Studios, the team behind Baldur’s Gate 3.

Black & White

One Of The Original God Games

If you’ve ever wondered why Peter Molyneux keeps getting funding for games despite not making much recently, you can obviously look to Fable as one reason, but the other is Black & White. It is, in many ways, a successor to the Populous series, also directed by Molyneux, which many credit for creating the “god game” genre. However, while Populous was impressive for its time (the late 80s), Black & White takes things to another level.

You play the literal hand of god, lording over a collection of tribes that populate several localized islands. You expand each tribe’s village, give tasks to villagers, and defend against enemy attacks. Adding to all this is your creature, an anthropomorphic animal like a tiger or an ape that can perform various tasks in the village and has distinct strengths and weaknesses. Your creature will steadily grow as you progress, learning and getting stronger as a result. The coolest thing about Black & White is that you can approach godhood however you like, and the game will adjust to reflect that. If you want to be an evil god, the music will change to suit your villainous tendencies, and your temple will look more intimidating, while the inverse is true if you play as a benevolent god.

Megaton Rainfall

Become A Superhero So Powerful That You’re God In All But Name

It’s not uncommon for people to look at famous superheroes like Superman or Doctor Manhattan and notice how they blur the line between mortal being and god. They’re so powerful, and the world is so utterly at their mercy, that the distinction between the two is pretty minimal. That’s exactly the kind of superhero you play as in Megaton Rainfall, a first-person VR game with a shocking degree of emergent gameplay and a dedication to offering a pure, unrestricted power fantasy.

As said superhero, your main goal is to defend the Earth from an alien invasion, using your powers to destroy their ships and prevent the destruction of human cities. However, once you finish the main campaign, you’ll unlock Free Roam mode. At this point, nothing is stopping you from just flying off and exploring the world. You can dive to the bottom of the ocean, fly out into space, and even exit the solar system. You cannot die from alien attacks, although during the campaign, you can “lose” when the main city is destroyed. In Free Roam, you are quite literally unstoppable and basically a god in all but name. The only way to “die” is to charge your most powerful attack and aim it at the ground, which will destroy the planet and trigger a hidden ending cutscene.

Age Of Mythology: Retold

Battle Of The Gods

Rather than playing as the god, Age of Mythology: Retold casts you as one of many distinct gods from history. Whether you want to play as Zeus, Ra, Kronos, or Odin, the option is there. The only catch is that you’ll then have to amass your forces and wage war against the armies of the other gods.

An RTS through and through, the god you choose will provide a god power to use on the field of battle, from removing fog of war to casting down lightning bolts (guess which god does that). Meanwhile, your units — both mythological and standard — battle against the opposing armies to gain a tactical advantage. The DLC expansions add more pantheons to explore, including Chinese, Japanese, and Aztec gods, giving you lots of variety in which style of godhood you want to play with.

From Dust

Manipulate The Land Itself

Back when Ubisoft was still willing to experiment with game design, they developed From Dust, a god game with one significant twist. Instead of controlling your worshipers, their villages, and the buildings therein, what you have control over is the terrain itself, as well as certain substances. For example, you can raise or lower the ground level, move water from the ocean to an inland lake, or cool lava to make molten rock.

The terrain isn’t at your beck and call, though. Natural disasters like tsunamis and volcanic eruptions will need to be contained if you want your tribe to survive. Even small-scale changes, such as water eroding surrounding soil, can affect the environment, which you will need to anticipate and plan around. By completing missions, you’ll unlock expanded abilities, which in turn open up new ways to manipulate the terrain, while also guiding your tribe closer to their goal. From Dust is a fascinating, one-of-a-kind god game that came and went without much fanfare, but if you’re looking for something fresh in the genre, it’s worth checking out.

Sintopia

Optimize The Living World And The Underworld

God games are almost always focused on the living world, but very rarely feature an afterlife. Sintopia changes that dynamic. While among your fellow demons, you aren’t a god by any stretch, you still boast a ton of godly powers that would easily convince mortals that you’re a divine being. That is, until you damn them to the underworld for all eternity.

Instead of focusing solely on the overworld, you need to balance your attention between the living Humus and the souls of the damned below. The underworld plays like a chaotic management sim where you create an efficient system to manage the sentencing of souls to their dooms while planning for their inevitable resurrection. The overworld, meanwhile, is more about ensuring that your steady stream of incoming souls remains plentiful, using your “divine” powers to push the Humus in one direction or another with a well-placed lightning bolt or an aptly-timed inferno. Sintopia is a very unique game that will likely surprise you with its depth and complexity. There is a lot to unlock, and all of it changes the tools you have at your disposal. What you do with those tools is up to you.