No Plow ~ 360 Crop Rotation
July 29, 2019 1:08 PM   Subscribe

DOTA, Fortnite, Overwatch, step aside for the new ruler of esports: the Farming Simulator League. Make sure you’re down with the kids by learning about the epic “rush tactic … which is when you steal away all the harvesters or bailers so that your opposing team is stranded in their field empty-handed. This hoarding strategy has apparently worked at least once already, to ‘brutal’ effect,” and watching the FSL intro video. posted by adrianhon (27 comments total) 13 users marked this as a favorite
 
Most unexpected sentence fragment in a video about competitive farming simulation: "Teleporting is disabled"
posted by nubs at 1:34 PM on July 29, 2019 [3 favorites]


Perhaps we need to make childhood a little more challenging than the neutered version of what the children of baby boomers have created.
posted by humboldt32 at 1:52 PM on July 29, 2019 [1 favorite]


Perhaps we need to make childhood a little more challenging than the neutered version of what the children of baby boomers have created.

Dude, I'm trying, but you should hear how the kids bitch when I ask them to leave their screens and water the tomatoes, feed the pigs, get the eggs...
posted by MonkeyToes at 2:09 PM on July 29, 2019 [8 favorites]


I wrote a press release about this two weeks ago. I was very happy. Over $280,000 in prizes! Across a year! Ha! I love it. I'm so happy again remembering that this is a thing.

Of course my immediate link to all my friends was this.
posted by OnTheLastCastle at 2:12 PM on July 29, 2019


I got sucked into a live-stream of Euro Truck Simulator and it was sort of pleasant to have as a work company. Also I just found the rig setup on this streamer and I have to wonder...at that point why not just go...drive trucks and be paid?
posted by msbutah at 2:25 PM on July 29, 2019 [3 favorites]


Pfft, bunch of Johny-come-lately's. I was doing this way back in 1995, when we'd play SimFarm and race to the best house upgrade. (Plantation of orange fields plus futures trading was my dirty secret. In a pinch (or a drought), livestock arbitrage all day) . Cropdusters were the best part of the game, but paused your progress while you tried to nuke the orange fungus from orbit--strictly reserved for when you had an insurmountable lead and wanted to brag.

I can still whistle the victory tune to this day.
posted by Mayor West at 2:44 PM on July 29, 2019 [3 favorites]


You can't get paid doing bong rips

I've driven every kind of rig that's ever been made
posted by thelonius at 3:06 PM on July 29, 2019 [14 favorites]


at that point why not just go...drive trucks and be paid?

The actual driving is only 70-90% of the job. The other 10-30% is often physically demanding. Plus no rig is as comfy as an office chair. And you often spend a lot of time not sleeping in your own bed.
posted by Mitheral at 3:09 PM on July 29, 2019 [6 favorites]


By the rude bridge that arched the flood
Their flags to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,
And launched the zerg-rush twitch streamed round the world.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 3:31 PM on July 29, 2019 [1 favorite]


You can't get paid doing bong rips while driving heavy machinery.

Lies, damn lies.
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 3:32 PM on July 29, 2019


I have to wonder...at that point why not just go...drive trucks and be paid?

You can't get paid doing bong rips while driving heavy machinery.


An older friend of mine drove trucks and delivered stuff. He was young, and dumb, but punctual, and so that day, long, long ago, he was right on time with his delivery to a big facility. He drove up to the gate, and rang the bell. Rang it again, then a few more times for good measure, to no avail. So, being young and dumb, he settled in for a smoke and a nap...only to interrupted 30 minutes later by an irate facility manager who (translating here) told him, God damn, son, haven't you ever heard of security cameras? And my friend, still young and dumb but now in a good mood, replied "Haven't you ever heard of answering your doorbell?"
posted by MonkeyToes at 3:35 PM on July 29, 2019 [13 favorites]


Perhaps we need to make childhood a little more challenging than the neutered version of what the children of baby boomers have created.

"Boomers" are the La Llorona for white people.
posted by sideshow at 3:49 PM on July 29, 2019 [4 favorites]


"I've driven every kind of rig that's ever been made"

From Tehachapi to Tonapah?
posted by humboldt32 at 4:00 PM on July 29, 2019


Broke: Baller
Woke: Bailer
posted by SPrintF at 5:11 PM on July 29, 2019 [3 favorites]


I love this game. It’s got fucked graphics and there’s no such thing as realism, but it doesn’t matter.

You get in a tractor and you plow a field. Or bale some hay. The tractors are huge and the harvesters are awesome. I’ll never in my life drive this stuff in real life, but it’s sure fun in the game.

No boss to defeat. Nobody dies, not even the animals you haven’t fed maybe ever. Just you and a tractor and something needing doing.

Multiplayer is about cooperation and teamwork. You win by getting jobs done, with your teammates and sometimes despite them (like when they drive all the machinery into a river). I know some guys that are all fired up for league play, but I’m not. I like to farm alone.

The stress of a day fades out when you get in a machine and drive it around a field for a while, not worrying about what will break or if a crop will fail. It’s okay. You get to plant it again if it does. And if you don’t finish a job, well, come back later. It’ll be there. No pressure.
posted by disclaimer at 5:33 PM on July 29, 2019 [3 favorites]


I'm surprisingly distressed to find that this isn't a simulator simulator, with growing seasons and concrete weather effects and working the spreadsheet to figure the costs on GMO seed vs. more pesticide/less crop insurance... I mean, in a real farming simulator the equipment choices would be driven mostly by repayment schedules vs. operational output... and I would play that game.

And the hardcore skill version would have a family member, perhaps the farmer himself, get cancer.
posted by fatbird at 7:24 PM on July 29, 2019 [4 favorites]


I always think of this

Ban this sick filth...
posted by Windopaene at 7:40 PM on July 29, 2019 [2 favorites]


Previouslier and it's in MN this year.
posted by joeyh at 8:56 PM on July 29, 2019


Dude, I'm trying, but you should hear how the kids bitch when I ask them to leave their screens and water the tomatoes, feed the pigs, get the eggs...

Your kids don't like Stardew Valley? That's impossible.
posted by Pyrogenesis at 10:54 PM on July 29, 2019 [3 favorites]


I used to get a regular fix of EVE online from metafilter posts about it. I don't want to play it, I just want to hear about millions of virtual dollars being lost and arrogant wankers being ripped new ones. Can I substitute this for that?
posted by maxwelton at 11:37 PM on July 29, 2019 [1 favorite]


Actually, when you add this, it’s much more realistic, and a whole lot harder to play.
posted by disclaimer at 12:52 AM on July 30, 2019


you should hear how the kids bitch when I ask them to leave their screens and water the tomatoes, feed the pigs, get the eggs...
You laugh, but this is pretty much what my wife and I experienced around 2004-2016, getting our kids to help with the homesteading.
Now, we didn't have pigs, but raised goats instead.
And we had a hard time with tomatoes in our climate, so it was more potatoes and squash...
posted by doctornemo at 6:10 AM on July 30, 2019 [1 favorite]


I have to wonder...at that point why not just go...drive trucks and be paid?

Real trucks don't have a community of viewers to chat with.
posted by daniel_charms at 6:24 AM on July 30, 2019


Real trucks don't have a community of viewers to chat with.

Don't truckers have CB radios or something functionally similar anymore? Or do they just call talk shows on satellite radio instead?
posted by Flexagon at 6:33 AM on July 30, 2019 [1 favorite]


In a few years, with 5G along all major routes, maybe long-haul trucker streaming will be a thing? I think it will.
posted by Harald74 at 3:10 AM on July 31, 2019 [2 favorites]


at that point why not just go...drive trucks and be paid?

The labor market for trucking is currently broken. Like many other labor markets.
posted by srboisvert at 5:21 AM on July 31, 2019


It's probably impossible to operate a motor vehicle for 10 hours a day and not occasionally, technically, break some regulation. Putting video tape evidence of that rule breaking out there for busy bodies or anyone with a grudge seems risky.
posted by Mitheral at 10:18 AM on July 31, 2019


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