The players are gods at the dawn of time, creating earth's landscape and inhabiting it with people. They can command the creation and destruction of continents and the rise and fall of civilizations. As gods, players seek to gain followers among the civilizations. They offer those followers luxuries, and oversee the building of pyramids and temples on their continents. In the end the god with the most loyal, wealthy, and powerful followers will become ruler of gods, and wins the game.

Players will place or replace triangular tiles to create different landmasses (islands, shorelines and continents) which may or may not be conducive to the creation of a civilization, and which may create war among two or more civilizations, or force the migration of one civilization to another landmass.

Scoring takes place when players cash in one of their scoring tokens, by playing temple tiles, or by the drawing of Epoch tiles.