Most gamers have a "dragon phase." It usually starts after getting roasted by a Rathalos in Monster Hunter or watching Alduin monologue in Skyrim. You think to yourself, "I don't want to fight that thing; I want to be that thing." But then you go looking for games where you play as a dragon and realize the pickings are surprisingly slim.
It's weird. We have a million games about being a soldier, a wizard, or a car, but being a giant, fire-breathing lizard? That’s a niche within a niche.
The problem with being too powerful
Game designers actually struggle with dragons. If you’re a dragon, you should be able to fly over every obstacle and melt every enemy. That’s the dream, right? But for a developer, that’s a balancing nightmare. If the player can just fly away, the level design breaks. If the player can kill everything in one hit, the "game" part of the game disappears. This is why so many titles end up making you play as a "young" dragon or a "weakened" dragon. It’s a bit of a cop-out, honestly.
Take Spyro the Dragon. It’s the most famous example by far. But let’s be real: Spyro is a dog in a dragon suit. He’s cute, he glides, he collects gems. He isn't exactly the terrifying force of nature from The Hobbit. Yet, for decades, the Spyro Reignited Trilogy has remained the gold standard because it actually nailed the movement. It’s snappy. It feels good. Most indie attempts at this genre feel like you’re steering a shopping cart through a swimming pool.
The cult classics you probably missed
If you want something "meatier" than Spyro, you have to dig into the graveyard of the early 2000s. Day of the Dragon (2019) is a big name in the "survival" space right now, but it's basically a tech demo for people who like to roleplay on Discord.
For actual gameplay, people still talk about Divinity: Dragon Commander by Larian Studios. This was before they became the Baldur’s Gate 3 giants. In Dragon Commander, you play as a jetpack-wearing dragon (yes, really) who commands armies in real-time strategy battles. It’s messy. It’s weird. It’s totally unique. You’re literally managing a kingdom’s politics and then diving into a 3D dogfight.
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Then there is I of the Dragon. It’s an old Russian-developed RPG from 2004. It’s janky as hell, but it’s one of the few games that lets you feel the scale. You start small, and by the end, you are a massive beast nuking entire villages from the sky. The physics were way ahead of their time, even if the voice acting sounds like it was recorded in a tin can.
Why flight is a mechanical nightmare
Flying isn't just "walking in the air."
In a typical RPG, the world is a series of corridors. Even "open world" games like The Witcher use mountains and water to keep you in certain areas. When you give the player wings, those walls disappear. Developers have to render much more of the map at once because you’re looking down from 5,000 feet. This leads to "pop-in," where trees and buildings suddenly appear out of thin air.
Century: Age of Ashes tried to fix the "dragon itch" by focusing entirely on multiplayer dogfighting. It looks gorgeous. The dragons feel heavy and fast. But it’s just a shooter with scales. You don’t get that feeling of living a life as a dragon—hoarding gold, burning down a knight's castle, or sleeping for a hundred years. That’s the role-playing fantasy people actually want.
The "Dragon Simulator" subculture
There is a very specific corner of the internet obsessed with "social" dragon games. Draconia and Day of the Dragon are the big ones here. These aren't really about "beating" a game. They are about being part of a biome.
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You hatch. You eat fish. You grow. You try not to get eaten by a bigger dragon played by a guy named "ShadowSlayer69."
It’s basically The Isle but with wings. Honestly, these games have some of the most dedicated communities I’ve ever seen. They spend hours discussing the anatomy of a wing membrane or the "proper" way a dragon should land. It’s a level of passion that mainstream developers usually ignore.
The "Dragon" games that aren't really dragon games
We have to talk about the "half-measures."
- Dragon's Dogma 2: You fight them, and it's incredible, but you never get to be one.
- Skyrim: You can "ride" them with the Dragonborn DLC, but it’s mostly scripted and feels like being on a very slow bus.
- Drakan: Order of the Flame: A total classic from 1999 where you play as a woman named Rynn and her dragon Arokh. You can hop on and off his back. It was revolutionary for its time because it bridged the gap between a third-person slasher and a flight sim.
If you’re looking for the best modern experience of games where you play as a dragon, you actually have to look at World of Warcraft: Dragonflight. For the first time, Blizzard actually built a "Dragonriding" system that feels kinetic. You have to manage momentum. You dive to gain speed. You pull up to trade that speed for height. It’s the most "dragon" a big-budget game has felt in ten years, even if you’re technically just a person riding a dragon.
Finding the right game for your specific itch
The "best" dragon game depends entirely on what part of the dragon fantasy you like.
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If you want to be a tiny, platforming mascot, go play the Spyro trilogy. If you want to be a god of destruction, hunt down a copy of The I of the Dragon or Drakan. If you want a social experience where you just "exist" as a creature, Day of the Dragon is your best bet, provided you have a beefy PC and a lot of patience for early-access bugs.
Most people don't realize that the indie scene is where the real innovation is happening. Games like Glyph (though you're a ball, the movement is very "draconic") or various VR projects are trying to solve the motion sickness issues inherent in 360-degree flight.
Actionable insights for the dragon-hungry player
- Check the Steam "Creature Sim" tag. Don't just search for "Dragon." Look for games tagged with "Atmospheric" and "Flight." You’ll find hidden gems like Golden Treasure: The Great Green, which is a hand-drawn RPG where you play the entire life cycle of a dragon, from egg to ancient. It’s more of a "Choose Your Own Adventure" book with stats, but the writing is incredible.
- Mod your existing games. If you own Skyrim on PC, the modding community has done what Bethesda wouldn't. Mods like "Flyable Dragons" or "Dragon Player Special" actually let you transform and fly properly, though it’s prone to crashing if your load order isn't perfect.
- Adjust your expectations on "Power Fantasy." The reason most dragon games fail is that they make you too strong too fast. Look for games that focus on the "struggle" of being a giant beast in a world built for humans.
- Keep an eye on "Beast Simulator" updates. This is a genre that moves slowly. Developers like the team behind Day of the Dragon are small. Follow their devlogs on Discord rather than waiting for a big IGN trailer; that's where the real progress is shown.
The reality is that we are still waiting for the "Red Dead Redemption" of dragon games—a high-budget, open-world epic that treats the creature with weight and realism. Until then, we’re stuck stitching together experiences from janky indies and 20-year-old classics. But honestly? The jank is part of the charm. There is something uniquely cool about a game that tries to let you be a five-ton flying lizard, even if it occasionally clips through a mountain.
To get started, I’d suggest downloading the Spyro Reignited Trilogy just to remember what good flight controls feel like, then immediately jumping into Golden Treasure: The Great Green to see the psychological side of being a monster. That combination covers the two halves of the dragon fantasy better than anything else on the market right now.