Farming Simulator '25 Review - Big tractor goes VROOM
If you are here seeking a comprehensive comparison between Farming Simulator 25 and previous iterations of the franchise, I would like to immediately apologise for being a disappointment. This is my first foray into the Farming Simulator games, despite being obsessed with farming sim games in general. To be honest, I’ve always been a little bit intimidated by this huge, detailed simulator filled with realistic and repetitive farm work. I don’t know what type of tyres I want to put on my tractor, so is this the game for me?
The tutorial in career mode eased me into things. Immediately, I felt like this game was more like PowerWash Simulator than a cosy farming sim, with relaxation coming from driving back and forth over fields as you sow and harvest crops. It’s immensely satisfying to find the perfect line and watch piles of wheat chaff build up behind your harvester.
Then, the game starts to feel like a tractor-based Grand Theft Auto, as you travel back and forth between fields, dodging traffic and trying to figure out how to make a trailer cooperate with you as you approach the little flashing waypoints on your minimap. (I’m sorry, Walter, for how many corners I accidentally cut early on while I was trying to learn how to drive.) The map shows the sheer number of fields that are available for purchase, all surrounding a town centre; if you earn enough money, you could essentially buy all the land and become mayor.
Soon, your grandfather decides you know enough to figure it out on your own and hands over the reins of his farm for you to manage. At first, I was glad that the default career mode started you on Walter’s farm. It means I had some fields, vehicles, and animal pastures already purchased and in various states of progress, rather than being overwhelmed by a blank canvas. However, I soon found Walter’s farm overwhelming in a different way: I owned so many things and, despite the tutorial, I didn’t really understand any of them.
I went back to the main menu and started a new farm from scratch instead. After I chose my first little patch of dirt, I enjoyed learning what was needed to make it function as a farm, one step at a time. Through trial and error, I figured out how to buy fields, build structures, and order animals. Soon I had beehives, a pet dog, and several chickens—although I couldn’t go into the chicken pasture and pat the baby chicks, which I think is a travesty.
Baby animals are a new addition to Farming Simulator 25. I’m glad these were included (even if I couldn’t cuddle them) because they are adorable. Watching the chicks sprint back and forth in their pasture was an endless source of joy. As I expanded further and could purchase baby goats for my farm, I was even more delighted as they bounced around.
Goats are also a new addition to Farming Simulator 25, as are water buffalo. These new animals allow your farm produce to expand to include goats milk and buffalo mozzarella, among other wares. Animal husbandry in general is complicated (as are most of the detail-oriented sub-professions of Farming Simulator) but satisfying once you figure out the needs of your different animals.
I refer to this as a sub-profession, but the animal husbandry aspect of Farming Simulator 25 could easily be a game of its own. Once you find a rabbit hole to dive into, it’s easy to forget how many other aspects of farming are available for you to explore in this game. For example, other than speaking to the blunt, no-nonsense lumberjack, Noah, I haven’t tried forestry and carpentry yet at all.
This game is huge. And everything in it is big too. The number of vehicles and tools, the vehicles themselves, the fields, and the learning curve. But I also found it significantly easier to sink my teeth into than I expected, based on what I’d previously heard about the franchise. There are a lot of quality-of-life features that make it possible to play while focusing on as much or as little detail as you’d like. Different farming jobs have ‘simple’ and ‘advanced’ controls, so you can think about farming in all its minutiae if you want to, but it’s not compulsory. When purchasing vehicles, there are plenty of customisation options, but you can also stick to all the defaults without major penalties. My life also improved when I learned the ways you can fast travel around the map, and use AI workers to tend to your crops or even drive your many vehicles from place to place for you.
This game is all about the vehicles. When I first loaded into the character creator and saw a full-body John Deere branded jumpsuit, I thought all the branding was a little silly, but I soon realised how much I cared about the manufacturers of my different in-game vehicles as I bought new additions for my garage. In an interview, Giants Software has discussed manufacturer licensing and how they decide which brands will be featured in the game. There are few mechanical differences between tractors or harvesters based on brand, to avoid suggesting one brand is ‘better’ than another within the game. Most vehicle categories feature a limited selection of licensed brands, based on a collaboration between the game’s needs and the manufacturer’s preferences; this encourages players to experiment with different brands because they can’t stick to one favourite across all categories. Selecting vehicles reminded me of the motorsports games of the early 2000s, where the different car models you chose impacted the paint job more than the torque. Perhaps this similarity makes sense, as Farming Simulator 25 is as much a vehicle simulator as a farming one—perhaps more so.
Despite Giants Software wanting players to love brands equally, the Farming Simulator subreddit is filled with people who have specific in-game brand loyalties discussing whether or not certain brands will be in the latest iteration of the franchise. Despite some people losing access to their favourite vehicles, overall it seems like a lot of issues or complaints with previous games in the franchise have been addressed by Farming Simulator 25. Although I don’t have other Farming Simulator games to compare it to, I have found Farming Simulator 25 to be a very good time. This game and its niche subject matter certainly wouldn’t appeal to everyone, but if you want tractors to become your new obsession, this is the game for you.
Farming Simulator 25 was reviewed on PC with code kindly supplied by the publisher.
