Farming Simulator 22 Preview – What is Really New

The upcoming Farming Simulator is a realistic management sim. You take the role of a modern farmer to build your ranch in creative ways.

It’s the 10th entry of the Farming Simulator series. The number 22 doesn’t refer to the saga’s number; it relates to the release year.

The franchise offers yearly releases with a small selection of new features. However, there were no “20” or “21” versions as the last game was Farmer Simulator 19. The longer production time is introducing the greatest amounts of new additions the series has ever seen.

Even so, we have to ask…does this game feel new compared to Farming Simulator 19? In particular, is it different than a modded previous-gen title?

Release Date and Platform

The new entry of the Farming saga debuts on November 22. Developers GAME and Giant Software are including a DLC on the base game for all pre-orders.

The DLC adds the following content:

The game will be available for Windows, macOS, PS5, PS4, PSVita, Xbox Series, Xbox One, and Google Stadia.

Pre-orders are available on the official page for the consoles above. You could go for the base game, which currently includes a free DLC. Or you could buy the Year 1 Bundle, which gives you access to every post-launch content for a year.

Crossplay and Multiplayer

Farmer Simulator 22 is a single-player as well as a multiplayer game. Up to 16 people can share a map and build a farm together.

The 22 version features crossplay across different consoles, console generations, PC, and Google Stadia. The number of people per server depends on the platforms in the server.

Each console has several players it can allocate on an online instance. Old-gen consoles and older PCs have a 6-player limit. Google Stadia, newer PCs, and new-gen consoles can allocate 16-players. So, the number of players that can join the server depends on the weakest console within the server.

Moreover, the game doesn’t allow cross-platform progression. Instead, each particular server saves the progress, and you would have to go back to the server to return to your “character.”

Lastly, every player should have the same content (like DLCs and mods) to share a server.

System Requirements

Farming Simulator 22 requires a simple PC. IF you’re looking for something relaxing to play on your modest laptop, this could be it.

As you see, the system specs are not too high.

What is Farming Simulator 22?

Every game has kept its essence. You’re a countryman building your farm across different scenarios in Europe and the USA. The series allows players to cultivate fruits and vegetables, raise cattle, and trade goodies.

The newer game is no different, albeit it brings a healthy amount of changes and new additions. Either way, the more upcoming simulator has many farming operations and activities focusing on animal husbandry, agriculture, and forestry.

So, for example, you can buy and raise cattle to produce cotton; tend your fields to harvest potatoes, corn, and wheat; and create a production line that turns your cows’ milk into cheese.

You can run your farm solo or in multiplayer mode. There’s also a multitude of player-created mods to tweak the game to your liking.

Here’s a gameplay video:

Gameplay

Once you enter the game, you choose one of the three available maps. Each one offers advantages in terms of climate, rivers, terrain, and animals.

Once you enter the game, you play in the first person as a farmer, and there’re various core experiences in the game.

The first core experience, the one developers use most of the marketing, is driving agricultural vehicles. You’ll use a different assortment of tractors to sow, grow, and reap your fields. It’s a so-so gameplay loop that revolves around quirky driving experiences.

Vehicle work takes the most amount of time in the game, as there’s plenty to do. You want to cultivate, harvest, and set up your production chains. Also, you’d need to transport your goodies to the city to sell your farm goodies.

The second core experience is playing outside of the vehicle to explore around your farm and nearby cities. Also, you need to get out of your cars to enter stores and buy, sell, or lease. These trading sites work via simple interfaces to buy and sell construction materials, tools, vehicles, and equipment.

A similar interface allows you to repair and customize your vehicles. You can change paint colors, tires, engines, and more.

The third core experience is building your farm. Farm Simulator 22 overhauled the building system to deliver a new interface and new materials.

That said, building works as you’d expect. You play with a birds-eye view, select building parts, and place them on your field.

Preview: The new build mode in Farming Simulator 22

Career Mode

These gameplay features work through the series’ long-running career mode.

Your role is expanding your farm with “old-school” machinery. The goal is to sell your farm goods to develop your ranch and buy better equipment.

You’re free to grow in any way you’d like. That means you get to choose where you invest your money, what animals to care for, and what you want to cultivate on your soils.

The game also creates dynamic quests. These give you different tasks you have to complete within a time limit, like delivering a load. If you meet these tasks, you can get some extra money.

Real-life Machinery

The game harnesses a reputation because of its realism, as you’ll be buying and working with real-life equipment and items.

For example, there’re over real-life tools and equipment you can work with. These include vehicles, harvesters, tools, and other miscellaneous.

Across these agricultural machines, you’ll find brands like CLASS, Case IH, New Holland, John Deere, Fendt, Keemper, McCormick, and Masey Ferguson.

The game has over a hundred brands selling tools, vehicles, and equipment. You’ll need to trade your farm’s goodies to sustain your machines.

New Features

As I said, Farmer Simulator 22 added a nice amount of new features, although maybe not enough to keep series fans and players happy. 

Even so, let’s start the section by remembering what I said above. Developers overhauled the building system and added tons of new items you can place with the build mode. 

The overhaul divided the building mode into five categories: buildings (for general items), production (for production chain necessities), animals (for animal care), decoration, and landscaping. There’re new tools to landscape and sculpt the land.

The next new feature is seasonal cycles. That means you’ll experience Winter, Spring, Summer, and Autumn during your playtime. These seasons influence your crops further, so you’ll have to follow time schedules to cultivate, grow, reap, and sell your products.

There’s a game menu that allows you to tweak how these seasons work. For instance, Winter doesn’t necessarily bring snow, but it may still bring challenges for your crops.

The game also includes three new crops (grapes, olives, and sorghum). These require new equipment, vehicles, and production lines the game brings forward as well.

Then, Farmer 22 introduces new brands to the game, like Rudolf Trailers and McCormick. There’re also new machine categories that complement the new crops.

There’re various new production chains in Farmer 22 as well. These are factories, which you can either build or find on the map. Factories introduce complex production chains that rely on ingredients: bring a set of components to the factory to produce items like bread, cake, or flour. 

Another significant addition is character customization. The game has a character creator screen to choose your physical aesthetics, genre, clothes, and haircuts. 

The graphics department is slightly better, with new interfaces and upgrades in the depth of field and textures.

Similarly, the game adds new sound effects and audio systems. These aim to create realistic sound effects for each vehicle. 

Lastly, Farming Simulator 22 is the first game in the series with crossplay. 

New Maps

The three maps in the game are new:

Elmcreek: It’s inspired by the US Midwest region. It offers large areas, vast open spaces, and multiple rivers across the land. 

The map includes small towns, gas stations on highways, and a small stadium.

Haut-Beyleron: It’s a countryside map inspired by France’s southeastern area (Alpes Province). It has a Mediterranean look with a topology identical to Frances’s southern regions. The rives in the area recreate real-life rives in the area. 

The map includes a gorgeous hillside, a castle, small communes, an observatory, and small towns. 

Erlengrat: It’s an update of an older Farmer Simulator 17 map. 

Mods

There’re several mods available on the game’s official site. These mods are available for macOS and Windows. 

However, there’s a separate tab for Xbox One and PS4 mods. Mods PC mods are also available for consoles, although some are PC exclusives.

Once Farming Simulator 22 launches, the site will probably add another Xbox Series / PS5 tab for extra mods.

These mods change, upgrade, customize, or add vehicles, machinery, and tools. They also add building materials, blocks, and similar. Other additions are quality of life changes, graphics, audio, and HUD.

There’re all kinds of things to choose from, as there are currently thousands of options for Farming 19 and Farming 18. For instance, Seasonal engine mods are available for both games.

One of the most popular mods is the Farming Simulator League Tournament Client DLC. It’s a community-made competitive mode, but it’s only available for PC on Farming Simulator 19. The game’s official modding team could make a newer version for Farming 22. 

Conclusion

Farming Simulator 22 is exactly what you’d expect from the franchise. It sells for a niche audience, so you may have never heard of it.

If you’re a series player, you may have seen the game has some nice additions. Previous games felt like more of the same, with a single extra add-on. 

The newer game, in comparison, has:

You may feel that’s not enough to sell a new title at full price, because these are add-ons on top of the same formula, for better or worse.

Particularly, PC players won’t feel this is anything new. Most of these additions are already available as mods. At the same time, developers are failing to add critical quality-of-life updates, like changing how equipment maintenance works, improving the HUD, or updating the graphics.

If you’re a newcomer, then I should tell you Farming Simulator 22 is quite complex. The sim genre is complicated and time-consuming by definition. But it’s also charming, well-crafted, and able to give you the subtle sense of accomplishment you may be craving.