Forget the Seychelles and Mauritius for your next vacation, the new trendy destination seems to be Montana! At least in the world of video games, since a few days before the release of Far Cry 5, Pure Farming 2018 also offers us to tread this state in the North of the United States. Obviously, here it is not a question of taking out the flamethrower to burn illegal plantations or the shotgun to decimate all the local fauna, but rather to be constructive by taking care of different crops and animals. This newcomer to the genre of agricultural simulations, outrageously dominated by the Farming Simulator series, has a first major advantage missing from the Focus hit: a real career mode (which we will avoid calling "campaign" so as not to fall easily), entitled "My first farm"! Intended for beginners, it allows you to gently acquire the basics of the agricultural genre and to motivate yourself by having a goal to achieve. In this case, it is a question of taking over the business from our late grandfather and paying off a debt of 275 dollars thanks to a bank loan of 000 dollars. We will therefore have to roll up our sleeves, plant crops, raise farm animals and make a profit from all these activities. We therefore start by doing everything ourselves, from plowing the fields to transporting the harvested resources, before being able to hire workers who will come to help us in the various daily tasks. Farming simulation enthusiasts will therefore not be out of place, Pure Farming clearly focuses on the fundamentals and does not seek to revolutionize the genre. However, we will note a certain abundance and a certain originality in terms of harvests, since we can, among other things, plow fields of wheat, potatoes or coffee beans, take care of different orchards in order to harvest plums, peppers, olives and other cherries, or even build greenhouses of tomatoes, eggplants and even wasabi!
GLOBAL AGRICULTURE
This profusion of cultures is explained by the will of the game to make us travel. Rather than being confined to one or two basic environments, as the competition too often does, Pure Farming 2018 gives us a look at the country. In addition to the previously mentioned Montana, you can also go to Colombia, Italy and Japan (a first extension dedicated to Germany is also available for fans of paid downloadable content…). Thus, the "Farm Challenges" mode allows you to face different scenarios related to one of the four main regions of the game: drought and attack of locusts in Montana, forest fires and rainy season in Colombia, wave of heat and employee strikes in Italy, or rice sowing and logistics optimization in Japan. There are about twenty of these scenarios, which ensures a very good lifespan for the game, especially since a sandbox mode is also available. On the animal side, we are entitled to the traditional cows, pigs, hens and rabbits (to which the sheep of the German map will eventually be added), with a little surprise in store: our cattle have a real life cycle and end up so by dying after a while, if you haven't already sold them, obviously. In the same vein, mechanical machines are subject to the wear and tear of time and must be regularly repaired, otherwise their performance and even their maneuverability will decrease. The vehicles are less numerous than in the Farming Simulator but remain modeled on real models. The brands Gomselmash, Gregoire, Landini, McCormick, Metaltech, Skybury and Zetor are notably represented.
BACK TO EARTH
Rather satisfactory so far, the picture is not idyllic so far. Pure Farming 2018 is the first game from the Ice Flames studio, and it shows. We are thus entitled to some more or less annoying and recurring bugs, ranging from the tractor which remains exceptionally stuck in the decor to the workers whose AI is clearly more artifice than intelligence strictly speaking. For example, they sometimes turn haphazardly in the field in the middle of harvest, or even turn the earth in the same place again and again. However, we can trust the developers to fix this kind of problem because they have already proven their responsiveness through the first patches available. Thus, the keyboard commands are now redefinable by the user, which was not the case at the beginning. Which isn't a bad thing because, by default, no logic really seems to guide the layout of the controls. Depending on the machine that we control, it will sometimes be necessary to use different keys to perform an action that is nevertheless identical. On the other hand, certain defects are not likely to be corrected by future patches and will remain a priori engraved in stone. This is the case with extremely dull graphics, which do not really honor the different countries visited, or even the total absence of a multiplayer mode. We will certainly have to wait for a next version (in 2019 or 2020) for Pure Farming to definitely play in the big leagues. But in the meantime, there is already something to have fun if you do not have the strength to wait until the next Farming Simulator.
