‘Pope Simulator’ video game lets you live out your papal dreams

Pope Simulator will let you step into the shoes of one of the most powerful people on Earth to see if you can bring about world peace.

Polish publishers, Ultimate Games,  haven’t set a launch date for the game but have uploaded a preview of the software to the Steam platform and say it is ‘coming soon’.

A new trailer for the game opens with white smoke coming from a chimney – likely a cut scene before the game begins with you as a newly elected Pontiff.

The stunning trailer gives some insight into how the user will step into papal life and live out the daily duties of the Pope – including prayer and blessings.

This is just an illustrative trailer as Ultimate Games have only just started working on the new simulator game – saying it will be some time before it is released.

This is just an illustrative trailer as Ultimate Games have only just started working on the new simulator game – saying it will be some time before it is released.

‘The works on the game art are at a very early preliminary stage and the first trailer has been released for illustrative purposes,’ said CEO Mateusz Zawadzki.

‘However, Pope Simulator is certainly a unique project demonstrating a serious approach to the subject,’ he added.

Ultimate Games say it will be up to players to determine how the game unfolds – with a series of choices to make on everything from meeting world leaders to families.

The game gives users the freedom to implement their own view of the world and interfere with global politics by meeting with world leaders.

The company says it is a ‘realistic simulator of the Pope – face the problems of the modern world from the point of view of the head of the Church.

‘Make decisions that will weigh on the fate of humanity, convert and support the crowds. Plan the church’s strategic actions through faithful envoys. Manage your travels around the globe. Fight for peace.’

The cost and timeframe for Pope Simulator haven’t been announced but it is unlikely to be available this year.

You start the game on the conclave day as a newly elected Pontiff – you choose your coat of arms and this can affect the course of the game.

‘However, every decision to interfere in the fate of the world comes at a price – with further actions you strengthen the faith of others, but you weaken yourself.’

Pope Simulator will let you step into the shoes of one of the most powerful people on Earth to see if you can bring about world peace

The cost and timeframe for Pope Simulator haven’t been announced but it is unlikely to be available this year. It will be sold on Steam when it is available

When you run out of strength in the game you can gain more by praying and summarising your accomplishments on a given day and to recover for more actions.

‘The Pope has no military or economic power behind him, but he has other means of influencing the world, which was evident in the 1980s, for example, when the communist system in Poland collapsed,’ said Zawadzki.

‘Our idea assumes the possibility to use, among others, the so-called soft power, and consequently influence the fate of the world and interfere in international politics. All this, of course, in accordance with the vision adopted by the player.’

A major investor in Ultimate Games is the publisher PlayWay – who created a game called I Am Jesus Christ where the user travelled the world performing miracles.

The game will only be available for Windows at launch and will require a machine with at least a Core i3-6100 processor in order to play it.

Vatican affairs specialist, John L Allen Jr, wrote in Crux that ‘It’s no accident, I suspect, that ‘Pope Simulator’ was developed in Poland, where a whole generation remembers the role of St. John Paul II in the dissolution of the Soviet empire.’