There are video games of just about every genre a person could imagine. From massive battle royale-style games to role-playing, adventure, and even simulation games, Life simulation games can take many forms, but one popular sub-genres is farming sims.

RELATED: The Best Farming Games On Nintendo Switch

Whether it's a game entirely focused on running a farm or it has a little more to it, it can be a ton of fun! There are so many of them that it can be hard to pick the best one. Keep reading to see the top farming games, ranked from the worst to the best.

Updated on August 5, 2023 by Rebecca Phillips: Who doesn't love a good farming game? Sinking hours into caring for your crops and livestock is such a relaxing way to spend time, it's no wonder we clamor for more and more farming sims. To satiate your desire for farm life, we've updated this list once again with the best farming games out there.

20 Disney Dreamlight Valley

If you're a fan of Disney, there's no better farming game than Disney Dreamlight Valley. Farming and growing crops play a large role in the game, where you'll befriend various characters from across Disney movies and help to restore Dreamlight Valley in the process.

You'll be able to design and decorate your own farm in the valley, where you can grow the crops you'll need to progress quests and help out the Disney inhabitants. With so many characters to assist and different kinds of crops to grow, you'll soon be lost in the magic on the valley, and be glad that you are.

19 Story Of Seasons: A Wonderful Life

The Story of Seasons series is always a good place to dive in if you're feeling that farming game itch, but Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life gives a bit of a twist on the genre staple that makes it all the more refreshing. As you go through each in-game year, the town and the characters grow and change.

Rather than the townspeople never seeming to age as you eternally grow crops, they develop as the years go on, giving you more incentive to keep going and see how things turn out. Of course, you can marry and have children too, which means you'll see how your spouse changes and your children grow up, too.

18 Rune Factory 4 Special

Rune Factory 4 Special is an incredibly wholesome and enjoyable fantasy-based farming game where farming is actually only a small piece of the gameplay pie. While you are given a nice plot of land to call your own where you can tend to crops and raise livestock, the game also lets you enjoy many other activities in this sublime fantasy world.

Related: Rune Factory 4 Special - Complete Guide And Walkthrough

Aside from the enjoyable farming, you can also participate in relationships and town events, you can head into many fun dungeon-crawling action RPG scenarios to become strong, and you can even cook and take on quests. Plus, every action in Rune Factory 4 Special leads to you gaining experience and thus becoming more efficient in that task. If you want a farming life-sim game to sink hours upon hours into, then Rune Factory 4 Special might just be for you.

17 Grow: Song Of The Evertree

Grow: Song of the Evertree, much like its predecessor, Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles, is all about freeform exploration, enjoying a beautiful narrative, and taking in the gorgeous sights and sounds of the lush and vibrant fantasy world.

You play as one of the last Everheart Alchemists, enjoying a wide range of farming activities while helping to restore the titular Evertree. By planting a special biome seed, you can literally regrow land which you farm and make it fertile all over again. If that wasn't enough, you also get to build brand-new villages in hopes of bringing new townsfolk to the Evertree region.

16 Farmer's Dynasty

Farmer's Dynasty is a farming-sim/RPG hybrid where the protagonist returns to their old family farm after living in the city for many years. The storyline isn't particularly strong, and you'll find yourself largely constructing the farm before actually getting to the fun 'farming' part of life, but the game still has a lot to offer.

As well as building your farm and cultivating crops, you can undertake different quests, build on your relationships with others, and even choose to settle down and raise a family if you want to.

15 Garden Paws

Garden Paws follows the somewhat common farming storyline where you inherit your grandparent's old farm. However, this game has a more unique spin for its story as you get to play as an adorable animal character, and the other people in town are all animals too.

RELATED: The Best Farming Sim Games For Beginners

Not only can players farm, craft, and discover lots of new places, like many other farming games, but plenty of other features make it feel even more immersive. You're tasked with making your own house and making sure that new structures are set up in town, and you also can run your own shop. Plus, there's also a multiplayer feature, so you can share this super sweet experience with your friends.

14 Staxel

Staxel is a PC game that may look like it borrows a great deal from Minecraft with its voxel style, but it is a worthy contender in its own right that offers a larger focus on farming and offers more of a standard farming-sim experience.

In Staxel, you build and maintain a farm, raise animals, cultivate crops, fish, and more. Additionally, you can befriend the local villagers and complete various quests to help them out.

13 Slime Rancher

Slime Rancher is a quirky, unique game that is set on a faraway planet where you control Beatrix LaBeau, a rancher who just moved to this planet to start a new life on the ranch.

You catch, breed, and care for different species of creatures known as Slimes, while also growing crops, expanding the ranch, and earning money by selling Plorts (essentially Slime poop) that you harvest from Slimes. There are also hidden mysteries to be discovered and the threat of Tarr Slimes to contend with.

12 Farming Simulator

Farming Simulator is a series of games that are, as the name suggests, totally based on farming. These games have been launched almost yearly since Farming Simulator 2008 and take a more realistic approach to farming sims.

Related: Farming Simulator 22 Vs. Farming Simulator 23: Which Game Is Better?

In these games, you run you farm, grow crops, raise animals, and then sell the products you harvest for a profit. If you want a serious farming experience, this series is perfect.

11 Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles

Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles is technically an open-world adventure game. However, it features some rather awesome farming-sim elements. You can build various farms across different biomes, take on different crafting specialties, fish, and more.

The game has a lot to offer, but it allows you to do so at your own pace. In addition to the usual farming elements, you can explore the world and track down sprites, befriend other characters, and complete quests.

10 Story Of Seasons: Friends Of Mineral Town

Story of Seasons: Friends of Mineral Town is a 3D remake of the original 2003 Game Boy title in the Harvest Moon series (which was later rebranded to Story of Seasons). Since it's a remake, many fans were excited to see how things might have changed or stayed the same in this new version.

The core of the game hasn't changed much, as the goal is still to run your farm, make friends, discover new items and areas, and start a family if you want to. While there weren't a lot of changes, some fans were disappointed, while others appreciated what was added or taken out from the original game. If you're a big fan of the Harvest Moon series, and you want to make sure that any problems were fixed or your favorite parts are still included, it might be a good idea to check some reviews before buying the game.

9 Sakuna: Of Rice And Ruin

On the surface, Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin might seem like it's primarily a side-scroller fighting game. However, given that you play as a harvest goddess named Sakuna, it makes sense that farming would be a big part of the story too. The game is essentially split into two different genres — hack-and-slash levels and farming-sim. That's part of what makes this game so unique and exciting to play.

RELATED: The Best Multiplayer Farm Games

Farming in this game can seem a lot more complicated than other farming sims. You have to pay close attention to things like how much you water the rice, what kinds of things you put in the fertilizer, and other more realistic aspects. This results in different kinds of rice growing on your farm, and each kind of rice actually changes the way that Sakuna fights after she eats it.

8 Sun Haven

This indie gem has flown under the radar for a surprisingly long time, not really gaining much attention until it had its official 1.0 release in early 2023. Sun Haven takes place in a classic high-fantasy style land, where magic is as common as having a good singing voice. You play as the recent arrival, who moved into the farmland right outside of town. Through farming, mining, and some adventurous combat, you uncover the secrets of Sun Haven and restore the balance of nature.

Sun Haven offers a deceptively deep experience, with an impressive amount of variety to multiple mechanics. When not farming, you're mining and forging gear, armor, and numerous types of furniture. You can learn magic, go fishing, explore, and befriend the locals from three different towns. And yes, you can romance and marry many of them.

7 Story Of Seasons: Pioneers Of Olive Town

Pioneers of Olive Town is another title in the Story of Seasons series, offering the same fan-loved features as its predecessors. You inherit your grandfather's old farm and can fix it up, expanding the farm size, growing crops, raising animals, and more. You are also able to begin romantic relationships with characters and even start your own families.

You can also purchase the Expansion Pass for the game, which has regular updates that add new content, including additional marriage candidates and characters featured in previous Harvest Moon/Story of Seasons titles.

6 Farm Together

Farm Together is a brilliant farming sim that can be played solo or with friends. While the gameplay mechanics get pretty in-depth when it comes to this title, it still manages to have a more relaxed style. The game uses a real-time system, so it continues even when you're not playing.

Related: Best Games To Play If You're A Green Thumb

There is a wealth of features available; as well as growing and tending to your crops, you can take care of animals, expand your farm, unlock new buildings and furnishings, and more.

5 Littlewood

Littlewood is a relaxing, expansive, and colorful RPG made by Sean Young, who you may know as the artist for the Kindergarten game series. The premise of the game starts with a scenario that you might not have thought about before: after an RPG hero saves the day, what happens to areas that were impacted by the villain's attacks?

With this setup, you become that hero, but you can now help rebuild the town of Solemn. So much of this game is open to the freedom to change the landscape and explore with ease. You'll meet lovable characters who will ask for your help, and you get to farm, craft, and overall just have a great time improving life in Solemn.

4 Terraria

Terraria is a building game that was originally launched in 2011 for PC but has since been ported to other formats too. This game has a super open-world setting, allowing you to do basically anything you want, much like Minecraft.

Whether it's staying at home to garden and grow a variety of crops or going out into the world to explore and gather materials, it's all up to you and your own creativity.

3 Minecraft

Minecraft has become one of the biggest games out there, which is no surprise due to the sheer size and unlimited fun of its open-world sandbox. Minecraft continues to receive regular updates, adding new features, creatures, and more.

Related: The Best Harvest Moon Games, Ranked

While most people associate Minecraft with building, farming is also a large part of it too, and you can easily while away the hours building and cultivating a range of different farms.

2 My Time At Portia

My Time at Portia originally launched in 2019 and has become a pretty popular indie simulation game since. In this game, you inhabit Pa's old workshop and are tasked with restoring it back to its former glory by growing crops, helping the people in town, and raising animals.

Alongside farming, the game also allows you to explore the mines, take part in festivals in the town of Portia, go fishing, play fun minigames, and cultivate romantic relationships with some of the local townspeople.

1 Stardew Valley

Stardew Valley is an indie game that's available on multiple different platforms. This game is similar to other popular farming-sim series, such as Harvest Moon, in that it doesn't just have a heavy emphasis on farming. It also puts a lot of focus on befriending and building relationships with people in the nearby town.

In this game, you're tasked with taking over your late grandfather's farm. There, you have crops and animals to raise, while helping to restore the nearby town by doing quests and completing various objectives.

Next: The Best Farming Games For Mobile