Hello Washers! 💦 Welcome to the PowerWash Simulator FAQ

A place for you to unwind to the soothing sounds of running water, take in the scenery and work towards that satisfying DING.

First releasing into Early Access, and then full release on 14 July 2022, PWS can be enjoyed solo, or make a splash with friends in co-op.

Is PowerWash Simulator available now?

Yes! PowerWash Simulator launched on 14th July 2022 and is available here:

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1290000/PowerWash_Simulator/

How many levels/maps are there?
Base Game

• 38 career jobs
  
• 14 bonus jobs
  
• 4 seasonal jobs

Special Packs

• Tomb Raider Special Pack – 5 Jobs – Free
  
• Midgar Special Pack – 5 Jobs – Free
  
• SpongeBob SquarePants Special Pack – 6 Jobs – Paid
  
• Back to the Future Special Pack – 5 Jobs – Paid
  
• Warhammer 40,000 Special Pack – 5 Jobs – Paid
  
• Alice's Adventures Special Pack – 5 Jobs – Paid
  
• Shrek Special Pack – 5 Jobs – Paid

Is there multiplayer?

Yes. Up to two people can tackle the game's story in career mode, whilst up to six players can replay levels in Free Play. Multiplayer is available online only.

During co op, only the host will gain the progression. Helpers can only access the hosts equipment.

What are the game modes?

Career Mode can be played with up to 2 people, earning money to be spent in game, with a story told through messages sent to the washer.

Free Play Mode can be played with groups of up to 6 people. Jobs completed in Career Mode can be accessed in Free Play

Challenge Mode provides time challenges and water challenges. In a Water Challenge, you must use the least amount of water you possibly can to achieve 100% on a level. In a Time Challenge, you need to clean the object in the level within a set time limit.

Is there crossplay?

Crossplay is available between PC (Steam and Windows) and Xbox with a room code.

Will there be regular updates?

Yes! We have a mix of free updates and paid Special Packs planned.

What’s the next PowerWash Simulator release?

We will reveal this to everyone soon

Does PowerWash Simulator have a story?

It does! All told through text messages in game and details dotted around the levels

Is there controller support?

Yes, the game should detect a controller automatically, if you go to the settings menu, in controls you can see the button mapping.

How do I disable rumble?

In steam, click steam, settings, controller settings, general controller settings, select your controller and you can enable/disable rumble. You will need to restart your client.

We will also look to add one into the game as soon as we can, thanks for your feedback and sorry for the inconvenience!

Can I stream/make content on the game?

Please do, we love to see content creators playing the game! We also give permission to monetize your streams/videos of PowerWash Simulator gameplay on livestreaming and on-demand platforms (such as YouTube, Twitch, Facebook, TikTok etc.)

How do I equip/buy more soap/refill?

To equip soap, you need to buy the soap nozzle for your power washer. You can then equip it like you would equip other nozzles. You can get to the shop on your tablet with the shopping cart icon in the top right.

Each level gives a set amount of soaps that you can buy from the shop, these accumulate or carry over from each level (new saves will have the full benefit of this) and you can buy from that stockpile at any point from the shop. Once bought you will have a set amount of that cleaner in litres you can use and refill.

To equip the different types of cleaners you can press:
Mouse & Keyboard - 3 for the radial menu or E for your inventory

Controller – B or menu button for your inventory
To refill, the bottle must be empty and you can simply press 'R’ /Left trigger

Will there be couch co-op?

No plans at the moment, but we will update here if anything changes!

Is there an official Discord Server?

Yes, you can join the PowerWash Simulator Discord here https://discord.com/invite/powerwashsimulator for exclusive teasers, direct contact with us, and a great community!

Will there be developer streams?

Yes, we stream on our FuturLab Twitch channel here: https://www.twitch.tv/futurlab

Is there an official trailer?

Our YouTube channel is here where you'll be able to catch all of our PowerWash Simulator videos! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC9tW5zVgnSHUryH3JMZFgO

Are there Achievements?

Yes, 90 currently, including those that can be earned in the Special Packs.

Will there be a demo?

Yes! A demo is now available

https://store.steampowered.com/app/2633700/PowerWash_Simulator_Demo/

Will there be a mobile version?

We’d love to, no news to share.

Are there key rebindings?

Yes, in the settings menu you can rebind your controls

What is the FPS limit?

We have just added support for up to 240FPS with several options in-between.

Will there be Workshop support?

There's no plans right now. If that changes in the future, we'll let everyone know. Sorry that this isn't the answer you probably want to hear.

Can I increase the FOV?

You can increase your FOV (field of view) in the graphics options area of the settings menu. Use the slider to increase or decrease to your preference.

Is there an official Reddit?

Yes, there's an official community run subreddit here. https://www.reddit.com/r/PowerWashSimulator/

What are you doing to help with motion sickness?

Aim Mode came May 19th in Update 0.9. This fixes the camera in place and lets you move the power washer separately to the camera. We hope this will help dramatically with motion sickness issues.

We added an FPS increase to make movement smoother on high refresh rate monitors and crosshair options to fix the crosshair always on your screen to focus away from motion on the edge of the screen. FOV options have also been added.

Some tips:
- Try turning on the crosshair to always-on, this puts a fixed point on your screen which can help reduce noticing the motion around the washing less. By default, it disappears when you fire.
- Try lowering your mouse sensitivity, this will make the washing motion less pronounced. (some players also wash more by moving their character rather than washers which is smoother)
- Try playing with the FOV (field of view), for most people higher will help. If you are close to the monitor a lower FOV can confuse your brain which expects a wider aspect. Though a minority of people also report lowering the FOV can help.
- Ease yourself into it. This is hard for us to say as ultimately if a game is making you feel unwell it isn't good. Though some players have reported smaller sessions building up to longer sessions can reduce motion sickness.

Will there be more accessibility features?

We recently changed the way our dirt highlight works, there are now 7 colours to choose from to help with anyone with colour vision deficiency.

We’d love to hear more on features you'd like us to add. Please submit suggestions in our Discord.

What IPs are you working with?

We would love to work with more IPs, please submit suggestions in our Discord

What specs do I need?

MINIMUM:

Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system
OS: Windows 8 (64-bit) or newer
Processor: Intel i5-760 (4*2800), AMD Phenom II
Memory: 4 GB RAM
Graphics: GeForce GTX 760, AMD R7-260X
DirectX: Version 11
Storage: 6 GB available space
Additional Notes: Requires a 64-bit processor and operating system

Is it Steam Deck compatible?

Verified. 😊

My game isn't running well, stuttering etc.

Please first check that your system meets the minimum requirements for the game on Steam

- if it doesn't match these, we can't guarantee that there will be good performance.

There are settings you can change to increase performance though. You can simply switch between the presets, or if these still aren't enough here's some more steps to try:

GRAPHICS: (most likely the culprit if you are constantly having bad performance)

The most powerful tool here is 'Render Resolution' turning this down dramatically decreases the draw on your GPU, but the graphics fidelity of the game will be decreased, you can experiment with this but 0.25 the lowest makes the game also look quite retro. Reducing/disabling all shadow options can help with CPU draw. Disabling Wetness VFX also can help as it is quite the power hog.

HARD DRIVE/SAVE: (most likely the culprit if there is stuttering occasionally when dirt is being removed)

To help with stuttering you can also turn off autosaves. Warning: with autosaves disabled, you will need to either load another level or close the game through the menu to save your washing. If you close the game with alt+f4 or the game crashes your wash data won't be added to your save for that session.

Extra:

Check that your resolution matches the resolution of your monitor. Check that all your computer drivers are up to date, especially graphics drivers which will mainly be NVIDIA or AMD.

How long is the game?

35-50 hours

What is Legacy/Classic Wash Mode?

Legacy is only for older hardware that doesn't support some newer DirectX features. It should automatically detect what you need by scanning your hardware but if you can't clean anything in-game you can turn on the Legacy mode which will fix this. Classic is as we intended the game to be. There isn't any real noticeable graphical or gameplay difference between the two.

Is there a physical edition?

Yes, there is a physical edition for all console versions. Get your copy at your favourite retailer.

What was the Research Edition?

It was a separate branch of the game on Steam where players could take part in gameplay-related surveys to help the study of video game mental health run by Oxford University. The version of the game is now closed, and the data from the study has moved on to its next stage with the University.

The results are in, you can read more about this here!
https://store.steampowered.com/news/group/40416158/view/4691152540827790717?l=english

Our links:

Discord: https://discord.com/invite/powerwashsimulator
Twitter: https://twitter.com/PowerWashSim
Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/futurlab
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@powerwashsim?
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/powerwashsim/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/powerwashsim
PWS Wiki: https://powerwash-simulator.fandom.com/wiki/PowerWash_Simulator_Wiki
PWS Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/PowerWashSimulator/