Viking farm
The Viking farm is a seasonal farm that opens up for you at level 35. On it you help young farmer Nils Nordson build a homestead inspired by the life of his Viking ancestors – you raise penguins and seals, grow flax and farm fish on the winter field, and sew Viking gear out of them in the workshop. The farm is only in the game for a limited time, usually 30 days, and once it ends, everything you built and produced is converted into dollars and Viking coins.
I treat the Viking farm as an event worth playing to the fullest from day one, because it ties into the horse ranch and the greenhouse on the main farm – without the horseshoes and Nordic fruit from this event, getting the ranch going is a lot harder. Anyone who only jumps in during the last week misses out on a big chunk of both the chapter rewards and the leaderboard ones.
You can reach the Viking farm from level 35
You unlock the Viking farm once your character hits level 35 – before that you won't get to Nils Nordson, no matter how well your main farm is running. The way there leads through the airport, where Captain Barnacle is waiting to fly you over. The game also tells of an ice bridge to the island during the frosts, one that only appears when temperatures really drop and vanishes as soon as it warms up above zero – and that is exactly why the farm has a limited lifespan, usually 30 days.
At the airport you first exchange regular dollars for snow dollars, the currency you build and upgrade with on the Viking farm. The rate is favorable, but between exchanges you have to wait for the Viking treasury to free up again. That's why it pays to upgrade it – with a higher treasury level you can exchange more money at once.
You build and upgrade the farm's buildings with snow dollars
The Viking farm has fourteen buildings split into several categories – the farmhouse, the special Viking treasury, production buildings, a field, two animal enclosures, orchards and houses. Most of them can be upgraded to level four; the exception is the Viking treasury, which you can push all the way to level eight.
| Building | Category | Price of first level | Max. level |
|---|---|---|---|
| Farmhouse | main | — | 4 |
| Viking treasury | special | 10 000 snow dollars | 8 |
| Viking workshop | production | — | 4 |
| Winter field | field | 20 000 snow dollars | 4 |
| Stone mill | production | 15 000 snow dollars | 4 |
| Penguin pond | animals | 25 000 snow dollars | 4 |
| Seal pond | animals | 60 000 snow dollars | 4 |
| Silo | production | 25 000 snow dollars | 4 |
| Kelp tank | production | 30 000 snow dollars | 4 |
| Tree grove | orchard | 60 000 snow dollars | 4 |
| Berry orchard | orchard | 78 000 snow dollars | 4 |
| Sheep pasture | orchard | 100 000 snow dollars | 4 |
| House | housing | 10 000 snow dollars | 4 |
| Fancy house | housing | 250 Gold | 4 |
You get the farmhouse and the Viking workshop for free right from the start, so you only ever pay to upgrade them. The one building you can't put up for snow dollars is the Fancy house – that one costs Gold, so I leave it for the end, once I know how many snow dollars I have left for everything else.
Production revolves around flax, fish and raising penguins and seals
On the winter field you pick which seed or roe to plant next – flax, sardines or herring. Every crop has a different growing time and a different yield: sardines and herring go on to become animal feed, while flax heads to the Viking workshop, where it is turned into Viking gear – a stylish tunic, a rustic tankard, a mighty helmet and a comfy cloak.
There are two animal buildings on the farm – the Penguin pond and the Seal pond. You feed both the penguins and the seals with fish feed, and each also has a premium feed variant. From the orchards (Tree grove, Berry orchard, Sheep pasture) you harvest wood, berries and sheep's wool, and manure plus plant scraps go on to make winter fertilizer, including a premium version. On top of that, limited-time special feed and seaweed fertilizer pop up during the event now and then, and it pays to process those first while they last.
You turn Viking coins into greenhouse seed at the Winter trader
Selling Viking gear and other farm products earns you Viking coins – the event's second currency, kept separate from snow dollars. You then spend Viking coins at the Winter trader, who shows up on your main farm from time to time and offers decorations and special seed in exchange (special flax seed, special sardine roe and herring roe).
That seed is worth sowing in the greenhouse on the main farm – it grows into Nordic fruit, which Captain Barnacle's ship carries away. For the fruit you ship off you get a reward you can put towards training horses on the horse ranch, usually in the form of horseshoes. In other words, the Viking farm is also the fastest way to kick-start your horse ranch – without horseshoes, the paddock, the riding arena and the stable never really get going.
The story has three chapters and the leaderboard rewards the hardest-working players
Progress on the Viking farm is split into three chapters – In the Footsteps of the Vikings, A Good Team and The Real Recipe for Success. Finishing each chapter earns you a reward you can use on the main farm, so it pays to keep moving through the story as you go instead of leaving it all for the last minute.
Alongside the chapters, a leaderboard runs for the whole event, counting the total number of Viking coins you collect – the top players walk away with a serious prize. There is also a hard work reward, which you get purely for collecting a certain amount of Viking coins, no matter where you end up in the leaderboard. Once the event wraps up after 30 days, the farm disappears and everything you built, produced or had in storage is converted into dollars and Viking coins.
