The thing with Farming Simulator 2015 or any game that has "Simulator" in its title is that these games are catered to a specific group of people and unfortunately I am not one of these people. So please take this review with a grain of salt or a ton, it depends on you, what you like and what you are into.
Farming Simulator 2015 is a game of patience and waiting, this is what I got from playing it. That, however, can be interpreted in many different ways. One might like the slow pacing as they say "He who goes slow, goes far", but for the casual player that slow increment can be insanely boring. I mean nothing really happens for the first couple of hours once you start playing the game. You start in a farm, a series of tutorials show in minimal detail what you can do and then the game sets you free to roam in first person perspective into this large farm and you start doing well, stuff.
There is a harvester you can use to harvest the wheat or whatever that is. Then there is a tractor which you can use to haul a carriage behind so you can fill that with the grain from the harvester to then go and sell in the store. For plowing and seeding the plot there are also two available machines from the get go. There is also another tractor which you can use to go around the map collecting more stuff, accept "missions" from other fellow farmers and so on.
But this is only the tip of the iceberg as you can go deep, very deep. By pressing the triangle button you go to the store where you can buy a sh*t ton of farming machines such as harvesters, plowers, tractors, other machines I don't understand, things you can attach to these machines that allow you to attach bigger things to the later, chainsaws to cut down trees, lorries, wood cutters and a huge variety of attachments I cannot comprehend. Oh, you can also buy sheep, chickens and cows.
To buy all these goodies you have to use cash and that is very hard at first to come by. Doing puny tasks for the farmers and selling the first crops will get you nowhere. So you'll have to take a loan from the bank, or two or three, but you have to pay back with great interests. Let's say that you pass that initial obstacle and you have a couple of machines and some plots, then the money will start pouring in. But still that is not enough to fulfill your dream of becoming the number one...farmer.
Then you start into the wood cutting and selling business. Invest in a couple of machines and hire AI workers to do the hard stuff. But still you are not satisfied. Well, go into the animal business, buy them for cheap, get milk, eggs, manure and wool, or sell them for profits. I like to use the cliche saying "The possibilities are endless..." but I want to add "...if you have the time and nerve". The mechanics are interesting if you really get into them. For example to harvest a crop isn't as easy as it sounds. You have to drive the harvester to the plot, attach the harvesting part, lower it down, start it, then start moving the harvester. Once done that, get on the tractor with the carriage, drive near the harvester, activate the pipe, wait for the grain to fall into the carriage, drive it to the shop, sell it and profit. This is only one of the processes you can perform using a combination of buttons, it's great if you want it to be.
Sure it seemed cool at start, but man you have to play a lot for things to get going and I simply don't have time to do that. I get it, it's a true simulation game, where the process is long and hard, but rewarding in the end. However it's just not for me. But that doesn't discourage you from giving it a try. I have seen some great farming enterprises in the online multiplayer where I joined other players, mostly to f*ck with them than help, but still what some of them had achieved baffles me. So there's also that, playing online co-op with your buddies is always fun no matter what game you are playing.
As for the presentation, the game looks OK, I guess. It is available for every platform out there, PC, consoles, mobile (microwave probably) but I played it on a PS4. I wasn't expecting much in terms of graphical quality. The textures close up look awful, but the draw distances and the skybox look fantastic offering some great sights as you can seen in the images captured directly from the PS4. Sound is ok, but again, I don't know how a real harvester or a woodcutter sound.
To sum up what I said, the sentence I used in the beginning still stands, take this review with a grain of salt or a ton. Putting that score is difficult since I don't have played the game to its full extent, I haven't seen everything the game has to offer, so my opinion is very subjective. I get what I saw, but I don't have the time to play it nor I want to do so. However if you're into this sort of stuff, go and buy this game, who knows maybe it's GOTY for you. Thanks for reading!
