Gaming and user-created content have been conceptually sound since the inception of each, but have never fully coalesced until recently. With upcoming titles boasting unique, player-generated experiences, gaming is approaching an era in which developers might assume more of a passive seat in directing the progression of the industry. However, if “choose-your-own-adventure” -style gameplay isn’t particularly your cup of tea, there are games which allow you to be a part-time architect and design your own levels from the ground up for all to enjoy. Here are the top ten user-created content based games.

10. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater Franchise

One of the most underrated examples of user-created content is the Tony Hawk series. In these games, players could create personalized skate parks with virtually every component found in the actual game. Besides allowing players to craft their own skate-topia, they could create custom missions in parks to try and mimic the story mode levels. It might have constricted the creativity in many ways and possessed its own share of flaws, but the fact remains that it is one of the earliest forms of user-creation as we know it.

9. Far Cry 2

Far Cry 2 may’ve been a completely unique single player experience, but the multiplayer was a whole different world. Were you to hop online in that game now, you’d have to download a new map for each match. User-created maps make up a majority of the ones used in battles, meaning you’ll never have to purchase a map pack at any time. Even better, you can create your own map pack and upload it to Xbox Live for players to do battle on. Take that, Halo.

8. Spore

Spore is a game which tried its hardest to push the boundaries of user-created content by allowing players to craft entire histories of their own choosing. Starting from the anamorphous cell stage, players could mould creatures into whatever form they desired and watch them grow from microscopic wanderers to intergalactic conquerors. What’s more, players could then upload their creatures into Spore’s database so that other players would find their monstrosities running amuck on their own planets. Nice.

7. Modern RPG’s (Fallout 3/Mass Effect/Alpha Protocol)

Modern RPG’s have stretched the outer limits of the imagination to unlimited reaches by making adventures dependant on player choice. Now your character really is you, unlike past RPG’s in which you simply named your character and watched as he/she followed the preset storyline. Today, you make the storyline. You decide your own fate… as long as that fate is within the boundaries set by the developers.

Do not fret, though, my role-playing adventurers; with every new RPG expanding the capabilities of the narrative, you’ll never find yourself telling the same story as a peer any time soon.

6. City of Heroes/Villains

The City of Heroes (and City of Villains) game really took the extra step in allowing players to create their own masked hero. With more customizable features than most folks will even want to go through, different abilities to mix and match and more, you really can’t lose when you give this game a try. If you think your hero or villain can be the next big Marvel or DC hit, make him real in one of the City of games and pit him against other heroes or villains to see what his real worth is.

5. The Sims

The Sims are iconic and synonymous with user-created content. There are people who have fully decked out their PC’s with all the necessary hardware and software just to optimize their virtual living experience. In The Sims, you can remake yourself into whatever you want to be and succeed at it without the necessities of everyday life like actual talent and effort. Boy, who’d have known fake life would be so popular? EA sure knows how to pick ‘em.

4. Little Big Planet

Little Big Planet is a game which requires more explanation and description than words can afford. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a video is worth one million. But if a video is only worth one million words, then actually playing this game for yourself reaches toward infinity. The creativity possible in this game supersedes the expected level by leaps and bounds. Rather than simple platforming levels, players have created levels which mimicked world 1-1 of the original Super Mario Bros, levels that played music, and one huge working calculator. There’s just no limit!

3. World of Warcraft

WoW is another game that is beyond words, but for different reasons. Players have historically devoted unhealthy amounts of hours into this game, which has fueled ongoing stereotypes of gamers being fat, motionless mouth-breathers with no real goals in life. That said… the game is pretty amazing.

You start off a low-level nothing killing the tiniest of creatures and have to work your way up in a living, breathing world which evolves each and every day. Player interaction is the fueling factor in providing the basis for a story created by the player in every possible aspect. Performing raids, taking down huge mythical beasts, and leveling up to become one of the greatest names in the World of Warcraft universe… and it all takes place right on your computer. No wonder people are dying with the mouse in their hands playing this.

2. Scribblenauts

Worried for a moment? Never fret, Scribblenauts is a game that’s impossible to exclude from any talk of user creation. Scribblenauts, hadn’t you heard of it, boasts over 10,000 words, 220 levels, and a spritely protagonist named Maxwell. In these levels you’ll be tasked with collecting a starrite via completing whatever mission is laid before you.

Perhaps you’ll have to push a beached whale back into the ocean, or simply retrieve the starrite from atop a tree. What matters is how you get the job done. In the case of the beached whale, you may use a bulldozer and shove it back into the water. In regards to the starrite in the tree, spawn a fireman and have him pull it down.

You could do those things. Or you could have Cthulu fight God on a skateboard with a shotgun, and collect the starrite from the rubble of the tree which falls in the aftermath. Heck, spawn a helicopter and crane and air lift the whale back into the water. Doesn’t matter that the job gets done, it’s how you get it done. Now go buy this game.

1. Mod Nation Racers

Yes, the number one of all is a game which has yet to be released. Can you really say you’re that surprised? Excitement always centers most around a game which exists mostly in our imaginations. Mod Nation Racers, in short, is Little Big Planet: Mario Kart Edition.

In long, Mod Nation Racers is Mario Kart: Kick Ass Edition. Players will craft their own custom tracks with easy-to –use terrain-deforming tools. You’ll pretty much be able to take a paint brush with something set on it (such as, oh I don’t know, houses?) and then hold down a button and drag it along the ground to place down whatever is set.  You can craft huge, elaborate tracks that trump the Indy 500 or tiny, miniature tracks that could barely fit a few bumper cars in it.

Character customization capitalizes on Little Big Planet’s advancements, too. Though the little things that’ll be driving the cars aren’t really sackboys/sackgirls, we can still privately think of them that way. Suit your little driver up with all the necessary gear to look fly while sportin’ your ride, and head off to the races in ways you probably can’t imagine. And I mean that literally.