How to Use Iso2God: Step-by-Step Guide for the Windows GUI

How to use Iso2God comes down to five moves: download and verify the Windows GUI, add your ISO, check the title metadata, pick a padding mode, and convert. The finished Games On Demand (GOD) package can then be copied to a modded Xbox 360 or uploaded over FTP. This guide uses the current r4dius v1.6.0 Windows GUI throughout.

One honesty note before the steps. Iso2God was originally released by Team 360h in 2010, and its final original version is v1.3.6. The v1.6.0 build used here is a community decompiled fork of that release — its own About text calls it a quality-of-life improvement mod from decompilation of the original v1.3.6 and states that it is not supported by Team 360h. This site is an unofficial fan resource, and no trustworthy download of the untouched 2010 original survives, so the maintained fork is the practical Windows GUI. Playing the GOD packages it creates requires a modded console (JTAG, RGH or a BadUpdate-class exploit) or the Xenia emulator — a stock retail Xbox 360 refuses the unlocked packages these tools produce.

What you need before you start

  • A Windows PC. The GUI is a .NET Windows Forms application (the fork project targets .NET Framework 4.8.1), and no native Linux or macOS build of the classic GUI exists. Linux and Mac users should use the command-line tool covered in our iso2god-rs guide instead.
  • An Xbox 360 or original Xbox ISO image that you dumped from a disc you own.
  • Enough free disk space for the ISO plus the converted output. Retail images are padded to roughly the full disc size, so budget around 7 GB per game before padding removal shrinks the result.
  • A transfer route for afterwards: a USB drive, the console hard drive, or a network connection for FTP upload.

Step 1: Download the GUI and verify the file

Get the fork build from the download page, which links the file as iso2god-r4dius-windows on GitHub Releases. The download is a single zip archive of 562,728 bytes. Before extracting anything, verify its SHA-256 checksum — this takes ten seconds and proves the file on your disk is byte-for-byte the file the maintainer published:

7288a31b884332d6436c9fb00e4573b58ea53062b21cbd3b828d8af651d759ac

On Windows 10 or 11, open PowerShell in the download folder and run Get-FileHash .\iso2god-v1.6.0.zip -Algorithm SHA256, or use certutil -hashfile iso2god-v1.6.0.zip SHA256 from Command Prompt. Compare the full string, not just the first few characters. If it differs, delete the file and download it again from the same GitHub Releases link rather than trusting a copy from elsewhere.

Step 2: Extract and look at what is inside

Extract the zip to a plain folder such as C:\Iso2God. You should find four files: Iso2God.exe (the converter itself), xextool.exe (the bundled helper that extracts XEX metadata such as Title ID and Media ID), gamelist_xbox360.csv and gamelist_xbox.csv (title lookup lists the fork uses to correct game names). Keep all four together — moving the executable away from xextool and the game lists breaks the metadata lookup. There is no installer and nothing to register; the program runs from the folder.

If Windows shows a SmartScreen prompt for an unsigned homebrew-era executable, that prompt on its own tells you nothing about this specific file — which is exactly why the checksum check in Step 1 matters. Verify the hash, and only proceed when it matches.

Step 3: Add your ISO

Launch Iso2God.exe and choose Add ISO, then browse to your image. The fork adds two conveniences the 2010 original did not have: you can select several ISOs at once, and you can drag and drop files onto the window. Each image becomes one row in the conversion queue, so a multi-disc game is handled by adding each disc as its own entry — see our multi-disc games guide for the install-disc exceptions that apply to titles such as GTA V and Battlefield 4.

Step 4: Check Name, Title ID and Media ID

Select a queued entry and review the metadata panel before converting. Iso2God runs the ISO’s default executable (XEX on Xbox 360, XBE on original Xbox) through xextool and shows the Name, Title ID, Media ID and thumbnail it found. Three checks are worth making:

  • Name — should match the game on the disc. The fork corrects many names from its game-list files; if a name is wrong or generic, edit it here, because this text is written into the GOD header and is what dashboards display.
  • Title ID — the eight-hex-digit identifier for the title. It decides the folder the package belongs in on the console (Content\0000000000000000\<TitleID>\00070000\), so a wrong Title ID means a game that never appears. It should never be blank for a retail disc image.
  • Media ID — identifies the specific disc pressing. Multi-disc releases share a Title ID but differ here and in their disc number, which is how dashboards tell discs apart.

If the thumbnail is missing or wrong, the fork includes fixes for thumbnail extraction, but a missing picture is cosmetic — the Title ID is the field that must be right.

Step 5: Choose a padding mode and output format

Padding is the filler that masters a small game up to the full disc layout, and removing it is where most of the space saving comes from. The GUI offers three modes — None (keep the layout byte-faithful), Partial (remove some padding) and Full (remove all of it). Start with Partial: it is the safe default, and full removal genuinely breaks some games. The documented counter-examples are covered in depth in our padding explained guide — Tetris – The Grand Master Ace needs Partial, and Wolfenstein: The New Order Disc 1 needs its padding left intact for the first conversion.

You also choose the output format: GOD package (the normal choice), GOD package plus a rebuilt ISO, or rebuilt ISO only. The rebuilt-ISO options pair with Full padding removal to produce a shrunken ISO instead of, or as well as, a GOD container.

Step 6: Convert and read the output

Click Convert and let the queue run. Conversion reads the whole image, rebuilds it as an SVOD package and writes two things to your output folder: a small header file named for the package, and a folder named <package>.data containing numbered part files (Data0000, Data0001, and so on). The header and its .data folder are one unit — never copy, rename or delete one without the other, or the console will report the content as corrupted. The format itself is explained in What Is the GOD Format?.

When conversion finishes, the fork can optionally delete the source ISO for you. Leave that option off until you have confirmed the GOD works on the console; storage is cheaper than re-dumping a disc.

Step 7: Get the game onto the console (or upload by FTP)

Copy the header file and the .data folder together into Content\0000000000000000\<TitleID>\00070000\ on the console drive or a configured USB device if you use the stock dashboard layout, or anywhere on the drive if you run Aurora or Freestyle Dash and let the dashboard scan it. Our GOD transfer guide walks through USB and hard-drive routes in detail.

Alternatively, skip the copying entirely: the GUI inherited an FTP uploader from the original code. Enter your console’s FTP details in Settings once, and finished packages upload in the background straight after conversion. The fork improves on the original here by letting you choose the destination path, with predefined targets for Hdd1, Usb0 and Usb1. See the FTP upload guide for console-side setup in Aurora, Freestyle Dash and XeXMenu.

Quick recap

  1. Download the v1.6.0 fork zip and verify SHA-256 7288a31b…59ac.
  2. Extract all four files together and run Iso2God.exe.
  3. Add ISO (multi-select and drag-and-drop work).
  4. Check Name, Title ID, Media ID and thumbnail from the xextool readout.
  5. Pick padding — Partial unless a game-specific note says otherwise — and the GOD output format.
  6. Convert, keep the header file and .data folder together, then copy or FTP the pair to the console.

Frequently asked questions

Is this the original Iso2God from 2010?

Not exactly. The original Team 360h tool ended at v1.3.6 in the 2010 era and was closed-source freeware for Windows. The v1.6.0 GUI in this guide is a community fork built by decompiling that release and adding quality-of-life features; it says so in its own About text. The conversion workflow — Add ISO, metadata check, padding choice, Convert — is the original’s workflow, which is why the fork is the honest way to teach it today.

Can I play the converted games on an unmodified Xbox 360?

No. Iso2God writes GOD packages with an unlocked licence, and a stock retail console only runs GOD content it downloaded itself under its own account and console licences. You need a JTAG, RGH or BadUpdate-class modded console, or you can open GOD packages in the Xenia emulator on PC.

Which padding mode should a beginner choose?

Partial. It removes a useful amount of padding while avoiding the games that break when every padded sector is stripped. Only switch to Full for a specific game once a reliable per-game note recommends it, and use None when a note says padding must stay, as with Wolfenstein: The New Order Disc 1.

Where do I get the tool on Linux or Mac?

The classic GUI has no native Linux or macOS build. Use iso2god-rs, the cross-platform command-line rewrite, via the download page and our iso2god-rs complete guide. More tutorials live in the Tutorials hub.

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