Finally caved and bought this. Hit a wall in the initial tutorial, after it directed me to harvest a small field and then stopped prompting me to do anything altogether. Guess I’ll go search down some youtubes or something.
Welcome!!! Mrsealyp on YouTube helped me a lot, as well as several others. To be frank, Giants software should have more video based stuff on their site, though the Academy writeups aren’t bad so far.
Re MrSealyP, for learning the very basics, it might be an idea to watch his FS19 videos instead. For one, I imagine he has at least one aimed at absolute beginners. But mainly because a lot of his FS22 “guides” at the this stage are more explorations of a feature , where he’s learning along with the viewer, than authoritative tutorials
Yeah, there was another YouTuber I now remember I watched for how to begin. There are a ton of them though so that leaves me without a name to recommend, I just don’t remember them all.
Mentioned to my coworker/teammate that I’ve started playing Farming Simulator, knowing his family owns a farming business. I got a dissertation on just how big the family business was. If you’ve ever eaten yellow/gold variety potatoes in North America, chances are they were from his family’s farm. They are that big. TONS of gear, equipment, temp/humidity monitored buildings, sorting, grading, packaging, etc. I guess the saddest thing he told me is that as one of three boys and 6 kids in the family, he didn’t want to pursue the family business at all. Farming is hard, harder still is keeping a family business going. His two other brothers are in it now but who knows what the future holds.
Not that it is terribly interesting but:
Heimbuch Potatoes
Many of the store brands from supermarket and larger wholesale stores are their potatoes marketed under a store brand.
My silage monster. I’ve never had much success with the silage working tools in FS, so I was pleased to see a dedicated tractor in FS22. It’s not perfect, but it’s vastly better than doing it with tools.
Apart from a heavy Fastrac, and maybe a couple of trailers, this is going to be my last big equipment purchase until I get a permanent forage harvester. Mainly I need to acquire a couple more fields and rearrange my crops so that my sugar fields are next to the sugar mill and my corn field(s) are next to the silage bunkers. I’m spending way too much time ferrying stuff around in October and November.
Also, it turns out the augur wagon does work with the forage harvester, but it won’t automatically pipe stuff into another trailer like a harvester will, which makes it much less useful than I was hoping, but still better than constantly unhooking a trailer.
Jesus … that’s a big tractor. I still have no clue how to do standard silage. I really should learn, I just bought another field to do pasture grass. Bales just don’t work in bulk, in fact there is a limit if I recall correctly: 200. So that puts me at less than 4 double-field clears before I’m full. Not that I typically wait that long to sell, it would just be better in bulk when I did. But then … storage as well. Is there a good video on working it manually?
That’s a big windrower!! And man I LOVE grass work. Seriously there was a lot of love and care put into the grass gear in game. The cool mowers, the windrowers, the pickup and balers, the bale auto-loaders, it’s all so cool to watch. Hell, the animation around some of it is amazing. I almost can’t stop watching the Pottinger baler as I’m driving it around. Also, want a device that really runs a tractor ragged, it’s that Pottinger pick-up/baler. Geez that thing puts some wear on my tractors. I’ve had to resort to using the cheapest tractor I have just so the repair fee isn’t horrible. I can lose up to 30% wear on a tractor pulling that thing on mow day. I dunno if it’s the age of my tractors or what.
In other news, Skipper Farms has expanded:
What’s sad is I don’t get those small homes and farm buildings in the lower left of the area below 50 and to the left of 51. That’s kind of cheesy. I could use the extra space. I’ve ended up parking vehicles there for grass work anyway.
OK this game is getting on my tits now.
I took @Ginger_Yellow’s advice and prepared to use herbicide on my field. Look in the shop, find herbicide which apparently is only available on pallets. OK, so I guess I need a pallet fork then? Yep, let’s buy one of those. Can’t attach it to my tractor. Absolutely no feedback whatsoever, it just bounces off the front.
OK, let’s have a closer look at the fork in the shop. Combinations. Ah! It’s compatible with a front loader apparently. Let’s buy one of those. Bounces harmlessly off my tractor again. No feedback whatsoever, it just doesn’t work.
At this point I’m resorting to reading the manual. Ah, there’s no manual.
I’m not asking for help with this specific problem, because that’s a bandage instead of a cure. What I want to ask is how does a new player like me work this stuff out without either watching a shitload of Youtube videos or posting on a forum every single time I want to achieve anything at all?
Oh and just as an aside, I took @Skipper’s advice and went to the map looking for fields in need of ploughing. It said field 46 does. Strange, I thought: I have crops growing there; surely ploughing would destroy the crops? But at this point I’m not intending to save before quitting anyway so I give it a try and yep, crops destroyed. So it does NOT, in fact, “need ploughing” then, does it? I’ll accept maybe 20% culpability on this one, but my main point is that the developer has absolutely zero interest in teaching people how to play their bloody game.
I think this feedback is why they started that academy site off their main page. Which, if you think about how many versions there have been already of this game, it says a lot that they NOW want to have better training for new players.
I know you didn’t ask for advice but leave the pallets at the store. Pull your gear up to it and “refill” while the gear is right beside the pallet. It’ll work for seed, lime, fertilizer, etc. This avoids needing any forklift, forks or hook attachments, front end loader, versahandler, etc. And I’m saying right now I only know those terms because I work for a company that makes heavy equipment. How Giants would expect a fan to know things like that makes me kind of cringe. I’m assuming they thought it would only be popular with actual farmers? Who would know all these things? The method I suggest works well if you like to flip between AI drivers because in the settings there is an option to have them, “auto-fill,” things like that in gear back to the level it was at when you asked them to drive it. It’s kind of simulating them running to the store and buying it for you. Which, in my opinion is an option that would be nice for the player, versus all that gear you mentioned, plus something to haul the stuff around, etc. You can certainly do all that but it’s game monotony that doesn’t reward much. There is no financial gain from hauling those pallets to your gear, storing it somewhere, etc.
I should mention, I know there is an actual fill for lime, it looks like a small silo thing over near one of the train areas. There might be the same for fertilizer, etc. That would make it easy to fill a large vehicle if needed, allowing transport to a silo, etc.
EDIT: I thought about my critique above and to be honest, I don’t think it’s fair to Giants that I’m making fun of lack of knowledge or understanding. Especially so since MSFS 2020 came with as little or LESS documentation about some of the stuff in that game. If it weren’t for a ton of YouTubes there, it would have been the same deal for me, lost in a lot of it. Maybe this is valid to sim games as a whole though. Give us documentation meat. Remember when a game came with a huge manual you could digest over multiple readings? We’re lucky if we even get keybinding charts now. It sucks.
Thanks for your thoughtful post. I agree it does say a lot that they only think to make an academy now (which at the time of writing is very bare, and what’s there doesn’t go into nearly enough detail).
However you also make an interesting counterpoint about flight sims, and possibly even exposed a sliver of hypocrisy in me. I’ve never complained about not having a manual for a flight sim (although X-Plane does attempt it, at least), but I was able to absorb the necessary knowledge seemingly without even realising I was doing it. I guess it’s because I have a genuine love for aviation, but not for farming. The only goal I have ever had with Farming Simulator is to play a relaxing game. Euro Truck Sim scratches the same itch actually.
But enough of the whataboutism! Yes flight sims are pretty bad for documentation but that doesn’t excuse Giants in my book. Why can’t the game just tell me why I can’t equip the front loader I bought? Especially this many versions down the line, this really ought to be a solved problem by now.
Anyway, I was going to refund it but I’m 3.1 hours in now so in order not to have wasted money I will try again at some point. Oh and I do sincerely appreciate the advice you guys have been giving me; I just hate that you’re doing the developer’s job for them.
Previous games had pretty decent in-game help, that seems to have completely vanished this year like they assume everyone knows what to do. It’s super strange.
Not all tractors can attach a front loader, and those that do need the right attachment for the brand of front loader you’re using.
To be fair to the game, “needing ploughing” doesn’t have anything to do with whether or not you destroy the crops. It just means that unless you plough, you will get the unploughed malus (35% yield penalty I think off the top of my head). That much is explained in game.
Okay, with both a medium lot and a small lot with pasture grass I’m BUSY. I’m also floating at least 100K a month along with everything else going on and expenditures/upgrades. I’m at the point I’d like a field lot just for a barn and extra production. And it seems like time to save for big gear. I feel like I’m moving up from early mid-game to late mid-game here but there is so. much. to. do.
Hell, forestry gear starts at several hundred thousand. Unless you chainsaw and load a flat trailer. That seems absurd.
McMaster and I did some multiplayer on his stream tonight and it worked great and was a lot of fun :)
Incidentally, while the tutorial is indeed terrible and you will have to head to the internet to find answers to lots of questions, there is actually a fair amount of information inside the game, you just have to know where to look for it. To give a simple example, the animals screen tells you what to have healthy/productive animals, but only after you’ve actually bought the animals in question.
At the very bottom of the pause menu is a library option. This actually has a lot of info that’s helpful when starting out. Be sure to read the whole thing.
When buying tools/vehicles, always pay attention to both the text in the upper right and the icons at the bottom. The former will tell you the key things about what the thing does (eg does it cultivate or not, what kind of trailer is this?) while the icons will tell you the power requirement, what crops it works with and what sort of fertiliser is used if applicable. If you’re starting out a new crop/animal husbandry, check out the packs in the store to get a sense of what equipment you need.
The growth and especially soil composition filters on the map are your best friends.
Pay attention to the help window and the prompts there. It will tell you when you can for instance refill a tool or overload (ie transfer crops from) a trailer, and the button descriptions will give you an idea of what’s possible with a given tool. Also pay attention to the indicator in the top left that tells you which tool is selected. If something isn’t working and you can’t figure out why, it’s probably because you don’t have the correct tool selected (G to switch on PC).
I have a question for you or anyone here. Besides grass, which I know how to do it with, how do I get 100% fertilizer on a standard crop instead of the 50% from my planter.
When do I apply again? When I try it has no effect.
Oh, I should mention I’m only trying solid fertilizer. Is that the issue? Do we have to switch up from solid for the second application?
Yes, based on my experience with FS 19 ( I haven’t played 22 yet) you need to use two types of fertilizer (solid and liquid) to get a 100%. So I’d say that is indeed the issue.
Roger that. I’ll try it here on my lunch break.