Doing Chores for Fun: A Lawn Mowing Simulator Review

By Manuel

Players: 1
Platforms: Nintendo Switch (Also available on all major platforms.)

Whenever I see a "_____ Simulator" game come up for review, I find that I'm both intrigued and worried. We've all seen these types of games before, and most of us wonder if they're any fun to play outside of doing so ironically. They always seem to be centered on the most mundane tasks, and often feel like quickly thrown-together cash grabs. I've personally played several that surprised me by how good they were, but I've also played just as many that weren't worth the time I spent on them. Enter Lawn Mowing Simulator. Lawn Mowing Simulator's title gives away its premise, and it recently launched on the Nintendo Switch, following a previous release on just about every other major platform. We're going to be taking a look at this version today, and see if it's worth playing, or if you're better off just going outside and mowing your lawn for real. We have a lot to cover, so let's get right into it!

I called my company "Cutting Edge"!

Several real world brands.

It probably comes as no surprise that there isn't a story in Lawn Mowing Simulator, though there is a rather lengthy Career Mode. This mode starts with you picking a starting mower from several real world models. After you test drive them all, and spend a large chunk of your starting money, you then create a logo, a company name, an avatar, and get to the mowing. Each cycle in the Career Mode is a week, and you can take on a job every day of that week. From there you work the contracts, earn money, maintain your equipment, and grow your business. You start out as just one man and his mower, but your outfit eventually evolves into one that runs an entire fleet of vehicles, and a small army of paid employees. Unlike other similar games, you don't get a lot of story attached to the jobs you take on, though there are some flavor text attached to both them and your potential employees. The only real sense of progression comes from you doing better than you did the previous week. Thankfully this isn't the only mode in the game, as you have several others to get your mowing fix satisfied. Challenge Mode gives you a job with set parameters like a strict timer or limited fuel supply, Quick Mow allows you to jump straight into a contract of your choosing, and Free Mow is basically Quick Mow, but with the ability to change/alter just about every aspect of the game. You're going to want to play Career Mode first though, as it unlocks most of the content in the other three modes. That's fine by me though, as Career gives you the best overview of how the game works. Speaking of which, let's move onto discussing gameplay.

The controls are surprisingly complicated.

I like to work on the edges first.

I have strong memories of watching King of The Hill as a child and being obsessed with the concept of ride-on mowers. I'd always wondered what it would be like riding one, and I also couldn't help but wonder why people would own one even if they only had tiny home lawns to maintain. While Lawn Mowing Simulator gave me the chance to realize my dream, it didn't exactly answer the latter point. Now I'll start all this by saying that I don't know a thing about lawn mowers outside of what this game, so don't get upset if I get some of the finer points incorrect. Lawn Mowing Simulator features three types of lawn mowers, one that collects clippings in a basket, one that sprays them off to the side, and one that grinds them to mulch so they don't have to be collected at all. Each mower has its pros and cons, and various stats that are far too complicated to cover within a review. I went with the mulch-making type mowers throughout my entire gameplay session as I was not a fan of having to empty the clippings from the collection basket, or having to walk around picking the cut grass up off the ground. There are definitely advantages to all of the mowers, but I went with the one that suited my gameplay style best. Each job has a set grass height that you adjust when you're on your mower, and you also have to be careful to not damage any of the customer's property. If you accidentally cut something you're not supposed to, or knock over a planter, you're given a fine. You can also flood your engine if the grass intake is too much, and if you're going too fast. This often leaves grass on the ground that you have to pick up, and sometimes can even damage the lawn itself. In short, you're going to have to go carefully and methodically through each contract's lawn. You're also timed on each job, but I don't think there's any way to fail by taking too long. Instead you're given a bonus if you're able to complete a job below its target time. I found this to be a very rare occurrence, but the challenge is there for those looking for it.

Be careful with the flowers!

I may take a long time, but I get few fines!

Mowing is obviously best done one straight line at a time, but I had a lot of trouble controlling my mower when it came to turning. I later learned that more expensive mowers have greater margins of error for things like width of cutting zone and turning, but I had a hell of a time navigating tight areas early on. I also just suck at driving in general, so I bet most players won't have as hard a time as I did. Besides taking fines for damaging property, you also can lose money by damaging your equipment. Running your blades on anything but the lawn caused them damage, crashing into walls bangs up your mower, and so on. Important fixes can be made in the field, but either way they're going to eat into your profits each time you have to shell out for expensive repairs. Even though all the talk so far has been about mowers, there are some on-foot tasks involved with each job too. Before mowing a lawn, you're given time to survey the site. This time is mainly used to pick up stray objects that may damage your mower if you run over them, but it can also be used to do things like look for trash repositories for your lawn clippings or just admire the scenery. Also, even though you technically can mow the entire lawn with your mower, you'll more than likely have to use a string trimmer to finish the job. This tool can get those pesky edges and other hard to reach areas, or it can simply pick up the slack on any stray spots you may have missed. You're able to finish a job whenever you like, though leaving a job incomplete obviously means a loss in the total payout. However, actually completing a contract means cutting 99.5% of all the grass. This is often easier said than done, as you can spend several minutes looking for that last percent of a percent of uncut lawn. Also, since it IS a percentage, smaller lawns can lead to lots of frustration looking for the one or two stray blades of grass that are keeping you there. Probably a bit too realistic for me, but the mowing is fun enough that I didn't care for it all that much in the end.

I never thought that I'd find something like mowing a lawn in a virtual environment fun, but I found myself going back to the game long after I had enough material for this review. I had a thriving business with several employees, but I'd go back for a calming job or two, and also to make sure all my workers were kept busy. The gameplay loop in Lawn Mowing Simulator is a lot of fun for those looking for a chill, ASMR-adjacent experience. I guess that can be said for a lot of these simulator-type games, but this one just hits right in a way that I find hard to describe. We'll cover some of the negatives later, but there's a certain charm here that keep me around despite the game's issues. Perhaps it was those old King of The Hill dreams coming back, but I like to think that there is more to it than just that. Speaking of which, there's a lot to do here and a lot of different ways to play the game. Besides just mowing lawns over and over again, you can also play is simply as a business simulation. While you'll still have to mow a lawn here and there yourself, and it takes several hours to get to the point where you even have a second employee, it really does open up the game when you hit that point. There are also other job types you can go on, such as picking up litter, and cutting lawns using only specific equipment. And while I may not be discussing the other game modes much here, they offer a nice change to the standard formula too. It was in those modes that I got to play around with other mowers I didn't have in the Career Mode, and where I learned what my preferences regarding mowers were. I only leave them out of the body of this review as they play largely the same as the jobs in Career Mode.

My first week report.

Look at that mansion!

Lawn Mowing Simulator has a rather simple concept, and I think that's part of the problem why the game isn't always as fun as other "simulator" games. I've played many games like this in the past, and some of them have even featured lawn mowing. It was never very involved, and it was often there simply as a side job for main tasks like gardening or home repair. Seeing a game that focuses solely on what another game might consider only one piece of a bigger picture is odd. Then there's the fact that I don't think this game is truly the most complete lawn mowing simulator out there. I understand that actually using a ride-on mower is the big draw of the game, but I was surprised to find that there were no push mowers available at all, and the only other grass-cutting tool you have is the strimmer. Some jobs had large, thin patches of grass that I could not get my mower into. Obviously I had to use my strimmer for them, but I couldn't help but think that the inclusion of a push mower would've been a real game changer. I'm not sure if it was for licensing reasons, or if the developers just didn't want to focus on that aspect of mowing, but it was an odd exclusion. In short, the game offers only one activity to do over and over again, and it doesn't even give you all the real-world options to perform said activity. Yes, I know there are also the litter removal jobs, but those were aren't exactly my idea of fun. There's a lot of content here, but it all boils down to the same thing in different fields.

I think it's a bit unfair to judge this game by its visuals, since I don't think anyone comes into these simulator-type experiences expecting anything close to cutting edge graphics. Lawn Mowing Simulator doesn't look bad for the most part, but I think it falters a bit on what is probably the one thing you'd expect them to get right. I loved wandering around properties, and I think that every yard was well-designed. I'm not sure if this is an asset-flip type situation, but even if it is, the developers were able to use what they had to great effect. Then there's the mowers that look shockingly realistic, the character models who aren't well-designed but look amusing enough to be endearing, and even the flowers and garden decorations that often made me want to take extra care to not harm in any way. Unfortunately it's all marred by the lawns themselves. I don't think I've seen such ugly grass ever in a game. I know there's probably some technical reason as to why it has to look the way it does, since there are countless graphics of blades of grass that have to look different depending on how the job is progressing, but it doesn't help that I often would wince at how the ground looked up close. Sometimes the mower would leave marks in the lawn from when it turns, and I was expecting things like that too not look great up close, but I was not expecting the lawn to look like I had destroyed it by doing the very thing I was tasked to do. I don't know if it comes across in pictures very well, but the lawns just make this a slightly ugly game overall. Thankfully you only really have to get close up to the ground during strimmer sections, but you'll often wish you somehow just mowed through everything whenever you do.

The ground check part is important.

Some jobs require lots of strimmer work.

I don't really have a lot to talk about when it comes to music and sound, be it negatives or positives. The game features some decently upbeat music in the various menus, but it's nothing particularly noteworthy. I found myself eventually humming along to the main theme that plays when you select your next job, but I wouldn't at all be surprised to learn that the game simply uses tracks from a music library. They're good for what they are, but you're not going to run out and pick up the soundtrack after listening to them. Things change up a lot when you enter a job though. From there you're pretty much mowing in silence, besides the sounds of your equipment and relevant ambient noise. This means you'll pretty much only hear the hum of your mower's engine, the birds in the trees, and maybe the sound of the blades cutting the grass. I wouldn't exactly go so far as to call it an ASMR-heavy experience, but the mostly silent gameplay does have a rather calming effect. Joined with the satisfaction that comes from the mowing itself, and you have something resembling a cozy game here. You can even add your own soundtrack if you like, though you'll obviously have to do that on your own end. Though I probably shouldn't give them credit for not having music here, I don't think I minded it at all. If anything, that's probably what made me appreciate the tracks that WERE there. I didn't hate any part of what was here, and didn't even miss what wasn't.

Even though I wonder how long I'll find mowing lawns in a video game to be fun, I have to say that Lawn Mowing Simulator sure gives you a lot of different ways to cut grass. I mostly talked about the Career Mode, but playing that unlocks a lot of options for all the other modes. Free Mow is probably my favorite as it lets you just do the relaxing part without any worry about messing up a job, or ruining your company's financial future. The missions in Challenge Mode are far outside of my current skills with the mowers, but I'm sure there are players out there who will appreciate the focus on playing harder jobs with limited resources. There's even DLC that I unfortunately did not try out for this review, but it looks interesting enough that I might pick it up if I ever see it on sale. Oh, and going back to that Career Mode, it can take 15-20 hours for things to really get going, and I'm not exactly sure there is an "end" to it. Seeing as the game currently runs you $19.99-$24.99 on the Switch (For the Digital and Landmark Editions respectively.), I think that's just about the right price for the amount of content you get. While I'm not implying that the game isn't worth its base price, it's been my experience that these "_____ Simulator" games often go on sale, so you can possibly get it for a discount if you're patient. However you choose to pick this one up, you'll have countless hours of gameplay ahead of you. The only thing missing at this point has to be multiplayer, but maybe we can get that in a future sequel.

This place was so messy.

I was just having fun at this point.

If you're a fan of these simulator-type games, or are looking for something chill and cozy to relax to, then you can't really can't go wrong with Lawn Mowing Simulator. There's a lot of fun to be had here, and the business management side of things make it so that you eventually don't have to focus so hard on the actual lawn mowing aspects if you don't want to. I'm not sure if fans of ACTUAL ride-on lawn mowers will find this an accurate representation of the activity, but perhaps they'll appreciate the real-world mowers that are so painstakingly recreated here. There's honestly a surprisingly wide audience for this game, and I'm here to say that it's totally worth picking up if you fall into any of the categories I just mentioned. Even though this review is solely about the Nintendo Switch release, you can also pick it up on just about any platform. Grab it however you can, and get out there! The grass isn't going to cut itself!

Check Out Lawn Mowing Simulator Landmark Edition on Nintendo Switch:
https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/lawn-mowing-simulator-landmark-edition-switch/

---

Story: N/A
Gameplay: B-
Graphics: B-
Music/Sound: B
Value: B

Overall: B-

Pros:
+ Does exactly what it says it will, provide a simulation of mowing a lawn!
+ There are some decent business management gameplay elements once you get decently far in the main game.
+ Has very accurate representations of several real-life mowers from a handful of licensed companies.
+ Several gameplay options make jumping into any mowing situation quick and easy.
+ The job locations look great and are very well-designed.
+ Can be a pretty relaxing experience if you're into this sort of thing.

Cons:
- Can be a little too heavy on the realism at times when it comes to carefully handling your mower's engine.
- Getting that full 99.5% completion can be quite frustrating at times.
- This is by no means a particularly good-looking game.
- Maybe could've had optional music for the mowing sections.
- While it's fully featured, I can't help but feel like this is just an expanded minigame from something like Garden Flipper.

A copy of this game was provided to us free-of-charge by the publisher for the purpose of this review. This did not affect our review in any way.

---

See you guys later!

#MownTheLawn