The farming life for me...
If you've played SimCity and enjoyed it, and are now looking for a more rural take on the city building genre, then American Farmer is going to be just your cup of tea. It's a well done look at the farming life and is detailed and relaxing enough to warrant a look, even if you've already got SimFarm. As with most games of a similar nature, your goal is to build up your farm after starting out with little more than the most basic of equipment and very limited funds. You can choose to play through several scenarios, each with their own specific set of goals and which act as a sort of tutorial, or if you're feeling more confident, dive into free mode, which allows you to develop things as you see fit. You've got to take command of everything, from choosing what sort of crops to grow, hiring workers to look after the land, selling your goods for profit, performing maintenance of equipment and so on. The game is played out via an attractive 3D perspective, which is both functional and appealing, and which helps to give the game some extra eye candy. If you are in the market for a farming sim, you can't really go wrong with this one. It's got all the detail and features you would expect, with an extensive range of crops, equipment and other farming bits and bobs to play around with. The visuals are simple but very effective, while the interface is slick and intuitive, making building up your dream farm a relative breeze. There's a good level of challenge too, and overall, this makes for an absorbing experience.
