Smite is a free-to-play MOBA game developed by Hi Rez Studios and Titan Forge Games. The title came out in 2014 and has a hugely dedicated following.
What distinguished Smite from other MOBAs that were available at the time was its unusual 3rd person perspective. Unlike League of Legends and DotA 2, Smite gave players the feeling that they were actually fighting in an arena and not just controlling a character.
The elements that make Smite an excellent game can be found in other titles as well. Some of them belong to the same genre while others belong to a different one that borrows these elements from MOBAs or RPGs.
This article will introduce you to 10 games like Smite, all of which are very fun to play.
League of Legends
League of Legends was the first spiritual successor of DotA, the famous Warcraft 3 mod that essentially gave birth to the MOBA genre. Launched in 2009 by Riot Games, LoL got a lot of attention from fans of every genre, from RPG fans to TBS fans. It’s an immensely popular game with a thriving competitive scene.
League of Legends is a standard MOBA with a team-based format. There are two teams of five players each and more than 140 characters (called champions) that you can choose from.
Each player picks one champion and then strives to become stronger as the game progresses. The battle takes place on a fairly symmetrical two-sided map. There are three lanes on the map. In between them there’s an area full of monsters to kill for gold and experience, called the jungle.
Each lane is full of towers that prevent human players from freely advancing toward the enemy base. It’s also full of minions sent by each side’s Nexus, which is the most important building inside a team’s base. These minions cannot be controlled, always stay on their lane, and simply attack whatever they encounter along the way.
The goal of the game is to destroy the opponent’s Nexus. But to do that you need to achieve other objectives first, such as destroying some towers. League is one of the best games like Smite for Smite fans who don’t mind switching up their game perspective a little.
DotA 2
DotA 2 was the second spiritual successor of DotA, coming out several years after League of Legends. It’s just as fun to play and offers a different flavor of the same concept that inspired LoL. If League of Legends is boxing, then Dota 2 is MMA. This MOBA is absolutely brutal.
In Dota 2, the characters you get to choose from are known as heroes. The goal is to level them up and gain as much gold as you can. To do this, you need to kill lane creeps, jungle creeps, and enemy heroes. You can also destroy enemy buildings to gain gold.
As you accumulate gold, you can spend it on powerful items that increase your stats and your resistance to damage. The team that becomes stronger at a faster pace usually wins. But DotA 2 allows for epic comebacks. If a level 15 hero kills a level 22 hero, the experience and gold they receive for that kill are substantial.
Just like in LoL, when a hero dies, it respawns after a number of seconds, depending on its level and other factors.
The goal of the game is to destroy the opponent’s Ancient, which is the most important structure in their base. But before you can do that you need to take down at least five towers: three of them from one lane and the two towers that sit in front of the Ancient.
Heroes of the Storm
Heroes of the Storm is a MOBA game from Blizzard Entertainment and was released in 2015. Its playstyle is unique and it’s even more fun if you’re familiar with the characters that you can pick.
In HotS, there are around 90 heroes that you can choose from and these heroes are based on Blizzard’s worlds. You will find characters from StarCraft 2, Diablo, World of Warcraft, and so on.
Unlike other MOBAs, Heroes of the Storm heavily focuses on the team and minimizes the power of the individual. In Dota 2 for instance, you often have in a team two or three underdeveloped heroes and one or two of them that are lightyears ahead of everybody else. Experience is shared in this game, though.
One thing that simplifies HotS and makes it easier to learn is the absence of items. There’s no gold that you need to gain and nothing to spend it on. You have your hero with its skill tree and that’s it. In a way it’s good, but in other ways it takes away from the complexity.
To excel at Heroes of the Storm, you need to always think about power spikes and counter picking, because the game requires you to fight all the time. Games are quick and there’s not a lot of farming. It’s perfect if you like games like Smite that are fast and action-packed.
Valorant
Valorant is not a MOBA game but it does borrow elements from this genre. Released in 2020 by Riot Games, this title has a huge following and a fantastic competitive scene with some of the best teams in the world.
Riot based its FPS mechanics on games like CS:GO and Overwatch, and then gave it a unique look and feel. What makes Valorant a worthy entry on this list of games like Smite is the agents that you get to pick and play with. The more you learn about Valorant agents, the better you become at the game.
An agent has multiple abilities and is unique in every way. Each agent has strengths and weaknesses and was designed for a specific role, such as initiator or sentinel. Based on a team’s strategy and tactics, agents also have a secondary role, such as Captain, Sniper, Support, or Entry Fragger.
In Valorant you don’t level up your character but you do charge up some of its abilities. This is usually done by dealing damage. Each ability has its own cooldown, so you need to plan ahead and use your tools wisely.
In Valorant, a lot depends on understanding what the combined abilities of the other team will enable them to do and how to neutralize their strengths. Every game uses a 5 vs. 5 format and the rounds feel a lot like those from CS:GO.
Overwatch
Overwatch was put together by Blizzard Entertainment in association with Iron Galaxy and was released in 2016. This is another game that falls into the hero shooter genre, which basically means that it’s a mixture of FPS and MOBA elements. Some would call it the spiritual successor of Team Fortress 2.
An Overwatch match uses a team vs. team format, with 6 players on each side. The action is fast-paced and fun, and the gameplay is quite addictive.
Overwatch has more than 30 heroes that you can choose from and each character is unique in its stats, look, abilities, and weapons. Based on your personal preference and your team’s strategy, you can pick whatever works best and then try to make a difference.
Some heroes are great at tanking damage while others excel at assassinating enemy heroes. The possibilities are endless and it’s up to you to find a way to succeed in every given scenario.
Overwatch features 4 types of maps, which correspond to the 4 available game modes: Assault, Control, Escort, and Hybrid.
Based on the map, you will know in advance what the objective will be and you’ll have the opportunity to select an appropriate hero who can assist your side in defeating the opponent. Unlike other games of its type, Overwatch has a respawn mechanic that’s time-based, not round-based.
Apex Legends
Apex Legends feels a lot like a mix between an FPS and a MOBA, but it goes in a different direction. One that is extremely popular in the world of competitive games: battle royale.
This title came out in 2019, after Fortnite, Overwatch, League of Legends, and so on, and you can tell very quickly that Respawn Entertainment had done their homework before making the design decisions.
There are many things to love about Apex Legends. My personal favorite is the mobility of the characters and their unique abilities. Each Apex legend has 3 abilities: a passive, a tactical, and an ultimate one.
The gameplay of Apex Legends encourages risk-taking and fast-paced action. Almost the entire time you’re on the move, searching for targets or trying to avoid getting killed. The more you risk early on, the higher your chances of winning if you succeed in staying alive.
Some items can be found, while others can be gained by participating in the action. The most powerful shield, for example, requires you to deal a lot of damage to enemy players.
In Apex Legends you are required to play on multiple maps that change regularly. Learning one map does not make you an expert on a completely different one. You need to spend time on all of them before you can say you have mastered the game. And if you want to get better at Apex Legends faster, you’ll need to learn about other game elements too.
This game is an interesting pick if you’re looking for games like Smite that move away from the MOBA genre but still provide a good blend of tactical gameplay and interesting combat. Smite fans are sure to love the variety in Apex Legends characters, too.
Paladins
Paladins falls in the same category as Overwatch, Valorant, and Apex Legends, in the sense that it’s a hero-based FPS game. The big difference, however, is that its MOBA elements are much stronger. For a title that belongs to the online hero shooter genre, Paladins feels very close to Smite and gives you the same vibe.
The greatest feature of this game is customization. Instead of picking characters with predefined stats and abilities, you get to customize them significantly at the start of each match, by picking cards that enhance them in various ways. You can continue to modify and upgrade your champion as the game progresses.
One challenging aspect of Paladins is the dynamism built into its design. While it is always fun to make changes to your character in search of an optimal strategy that will allow you to win the game, it may not be so fun to adapt to what your opponents are doing.
In LoL or DotA 2 for example, you know in advance what the strengths and weaknesses of every given character are. But in Paladins, the action is a lot more chaotic and requires you to pay attention to every small change if you want to be able to calculate your odds of success correctly. It’s a technical and intriguing game.
Champions can change their loadout and buy items that empower them. It’s up to you to determine what would lead to victory in any given situation. It’s a brilliant option for Smite fans looking for something that’ll test their gaming skills and strategic abilities.
Battlerite
Battlerite is a simplified MOBA game that focuses heavily on PvP. There are no lanes or minions to farm, and matches revolve around champions battling each other. There are dozens of champions and you get to pick one. Every round lasts for just a few minutes and the action feels a lot like MMA.
In total, there are 5 maps that you can play on but the variety is mostly cosmetic. In terms of how it’s played, the game stays nearly identical on each of them and the need to adapt is minimal. Because of this, Battlerite is well-suited for very young players who might find a full MOBA experience overwhelming.
Battlerite battles incentivize players to be proactive and occupy the geometric shape that exists on the floor at the center of each map. Sitting on it gives you experience and allows you to become stronger.
Because it focuses on the battle element, Battlerite champions have significantly more abilities than LoL champions. Furthermore, these abilities can be modified and enhanced for even greater variety.
If you enjoy combat-focused games and would like to try one that’s team-based, Battlerite can be very fun. Think of it as multiplayer Mortal Kombat or simply as a multiplayer PvP mode.
Wild Rift
Wild Rift is Riot Games’ mobile version of League of Legends. This game is played by an immense mobile audience and is very similar to the PC version, albeit with fewer champions available for players to pick from.
Wild Rift is an excellent choice if you’re traveling and want to play a MOBA game. If you’re familiar with LoL, you should definitely pick this mobile game over the other games like Smite in this list because you won’t need to spend countless hours learning what the characters do and how to play them.
The biggest challenge that you need to overcome in Wild Rift is the interface. MOBA games are not exactly simple and the combos that you can perform on a keyboard can be hard to replicate on a phone. It can take a few days or even weeks until you’ve mastered the smaller interface.
In Wild Rift, just like in any other MOBA, you need to understand the meta and pay attention to what your opponents have picked before choosing your champion. The game is relatively fast-paced and requires good cooperation to achieve victory.
In the early game, you will feel protected by your own towers, but as time goes by, you will need to rely more and more on yourself and your teammates.
Mobile Legends Bang Bang
Mobile Legends Bang Bang is the last title on this list of 10 games like Smite and its design is very similar to that of Riot’s Wild Rift. This game has received a lot of attention from mobile gamers and has amassed a large player base.
The game looks and feels like a standard MOBA. There are 5 heroes on each side of the map and you get to pick yours from a pool of more than 100 options.
The action, the progression, the map, and the battles feel very similar to League of Legends. But there’s still enough novelty to treat this game as an independent MOBA. It’s a worthwhile pick for Smite fans looking to try out a mobile game.
The goal in MLBB is to destroy the opposing team’s base and the best way to do that is to make yourself stronger than the enemy team.