Food is an essential part of most colony sims. Without it, the populace will die, and whether one is trying to keep an entire planet or a single hamlet alive, letting everyone starve to death isn’t the way to do it. Some colony sims are more granular than others, however, making crop cultivation a tricky and time-consuming business.

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New colony simFarthest Frontieris on the more granular end of the spectrum, giving crops a variety of traits that must be carefully tracked and weighed against one another if the player is to optimize their output and keep everyone fed.For new players, that can be as difficultas it sounds, and in a game about pushing the limits of civilization in a hostile wilderness, farming as a whole can be daunting. Here’s everything that players need to know about the best food to grow.

The Basics Of Farming

Farming inFarthest Frontieris a complicated business compared to farming in most colony sims, which can bea little overwhelming for beginners.The first thing to know when trying to pick the best food to grow is that many factors of crops are beyond the player’s control. A crop’s tolerance for temperature changes and the presence of weeds and rocks, its dependence upon high quality soil, its yield and growing time, and its impact upon the fertility of the soil in which it is planted are all beyond the player’s control.The player can account for these things when making decisions, but can’t alter them directly.

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Instead, the player should concentrate on manipulating the factors that they can control inthis addictive city-builder:Fertility, Weed Level, Rockiness,andSoil Mixture. Weed Level and Rockinessare the most basic: some foods don’t grow well when the fields they are planted in contain too many weeds or rocks, but the player can doField Maintenanceto remove the offending objects and improve their farm.

The player can also adjust theSoil Mixtureof their fields, adding moreClayorSanduntil the field is the ideal planting space for the desired crops. Last and perhaps most important isFertility,a quality that most crops cause to decrease at harvest time. MaintainingFertilityrequires intelligentCrop Rotations,which is a problem in itself. All this complexity makesFarthest Frontiera great real life sim,but it can be hard to process at first.

Farthest Frontier - Winter Fields

The Best Food To Grow

Farms don’t necessarily need to be built right away,but farming will inevitably become a core part of gameplay. InFarthest Frontier,players plan their farming three years in advance.This pre-planning feature is incredibly important,because it allows the player to leave themselves time to plantCloverto increaseFertilityor scheduleField Maintenanceto remove pesky obstructions, thereby ensuring they can continue to grow good food.

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What crops are best depend upon the player’s needs at any given time, but the following crops are reliable choices tomake sure the focal city flourishes:

Farthest Frontier - Resources