Giants Software has officially revealed the latest entry in the well-known Farming Simulator series — Farming Simulator 22. The new simulator will feature built-in seasons (a series first), over 400 pieces of machinery from over 100 real-world brands, as well as brand new machine categories that will allow players to take their virtual farming experiences even further.
Not only has the gameplay variety been widened, but the sim’s engine has also been improved to include enhancements to the AI, “richer worlds,” sound upgrades, and arguably the biggest new feature for PC owners, DirectX 12 support.
Bigger and badder
The move to DirectX 12 allows the new Farming Simulator 22 to take advantage of multi-threading optimization, texture streaming, occlusion culling, and temporal anti-aliasing. This will all be in addition to other optimizations and upgrades that have been made to the new Giants Engine 9. Modders also benefit from this upgrade, as it will introduce “more complex mod customization,” which is going to be a big deal to many players. This franchise has a hearty modding community, after all.
Farming Simulator 22 is the first full-scale entry since all the way back in late 2018. This is the longest gap that Farming Sim fans have endured to be sure. For quite a while now, the series has followed a biannual release schedule on PC and home consoles.
A long time coming
Last year, the developers announced that there wouldn’t be a new release. The only reason given was that the team was waiting to see what would come of the next-generation consoles.
In the meantime, fans were tided over with three more expansions, like the Alpine Expansion and a few smaller updates. Now that the next-gen consoles are on the market, Farming Simulator 22 will be able to support them alongside offering PC players more graphics options and settings.
At this point, the journey will soon begin. Farming Simulator 22 is set to launch in Q4 of this year, and if history is anything to go by, you should expect it by autumn. As that time approaches, more new details will be gradually revealed by the team at Giants.