I learned how to powerwash my backyard by playing PowerWash Simulator. Saying you learned a real-life skill from a video game can sound questionable, but in this case, it's true—at least partially. The 2022 simulation game from UK developer FuturLab doesn't directly copy the realities of powerwashing. It doesn't capture the physical exhaustion, the awkward handling of all the cables, or the hassle of cleanup after you've finished the job. Instead, it captures the spirit of the task, the satisfaction of watching years of caked-up dirt fly off to expose whatever material was actually waiting underneath. 

FuturLab was able to nail this sensation by researching the real-life powerwashing community during development. In fact, FuturLab CEO Kirsty Rigden was inspired to create PowerWash Simulator after watching powerwashing videos on Reddit. However, at the time, the studio's small team size limited what features it could include. 

That changed with PowerWash Simulator 2. Not only is the team substantially larger now (with over 100 employees), but according to Lead Designer Nick McCarthy, the sequel gave FuturLab the chance to add highly requested tools that improve the underlying powerwashing experience. 

"We just wanted to take a big step up, to sort of evolve what are the stars of the show: improved washing mechanics, new tools, better multiplayer, massive new jobs to play," McCarthy said in an interview with the Epic Games Store. 

But these improvements aren’t always in service of realism. FuturLab doesn't fully replicate the real-world powerwashing experience with all its inconveniences and tedium. Instead, FuturLab wanted to distill what was most "satisfying" (a word McCarthy repeated a lot during our interview) about powerwashing.
 

Looking to the community for guidance

I loved watching years of dirt buildup come off when powerwashing my backyard—but then I had to actually remove the dirt, bucket by bucket, and all that hard labor left me sore after. A few years prior, Rigden went through a similar process.

"I bought a powerwasher to clean our patio, and I found the actual cleaning process super fun, but all the set-up and mess quickly took away from that," Rigden said in an interview on the FuturLab website. 

Around that time, Rigden also discovered powerwashing subreddits—along with the nearly endless rabbit hole of satisfying cleaning videos. "I found myself browsing this subreddit all the time," said Rigden. "It was exactly the type of oddly satisfying content that scratched the itch in my brain."

PowerWash Simulator was born, and during its development, FuturLab turned to the same real-world powerwashing community to understand how it all worked. That's where the team learned about the different nozzles and attachments, each designed to better clean different surfaces, and how extensions can help tackle a job from close up or from many feet away. For example, a 40-degree white nozzle hits wide swaths of dirt at the cost of water pressure, while a zero-degree turbo nozzle can target a particularly tough stain with as much pressure as possible. 

Did you know that the color-coded nozzles in PowerWash Simulator are the same in real life? That made it easy to figure out which nozzle to choose for my backyard.

FuturLab included a lot of tools in the original PowerWash Simulator, but there remained a lot of untapped potential—in part because they began development with only 11 full-time team members. 

"We're always looking online and looking to real life to see what tools to add," McCarthy explained. "But because we were a smaller team, there were only so many tools that we could make part of the experience of the first game."

Fortunately, they were able to expand the team after the success of PowerWash Simulator and its multiple crossover DLCs and mission packs. To figure out which new features the sequel should include, they returned to studying the real-world powerwashing community on places like Reddit. 

One PowerWash Simulator 2 feature was actually "earmarked" during development of the first game, according to McCarthy: the highly anticipated surface cleaner attachment. In PowerWash Simulator, you had to rely on the regular wand heads to wash everything, even if the attachment wasn't appropriate for the situation. This made washing close surfaces like floors or low ceilings difficult. Futurlab knew that the game needed this kind of tool, but it lacked the resources to get it working in PowerWash Simulator. 

Enter the SwirlForce Surf Ace in PowerWash Simulator 2. This spinning disc attachment works wonders on flat surfaces, enabling the player to smoothly wash floors or even (in one level) a whole billboard without having to worry about streaks or uneven washing. 

The level design also got an upgrade in PowerWash Simulator 2—and so did your tools for navigating it. In the original PowerWash Simulator, you had a few ladders and a tall scaffold to reach muck in high places, but ascending the scaffold’s spiraling stairs wasn't great for motion sickness and took a lot of time. Now, there are ladders on the sides of the scaffold that provide more flexibility for climbing up. 

FuturLab also added two new tools for traversal. The first is a scissor lift that raises you up with the push of a button so you can target specific areas quickly. There's also abseiling, meaning you can get up close and personal with high surfaces by dangling on a swing attached to wires. Finish one area, and you can easily swing to the next. 

"On the developer side, it also helps us to design levels we wouldn't have otherwise," McCarthy said. One such level is an almost completely vertical rock climbing tower, which needed an easy way to get to the top. Abseiling is also thematically appropriate, in that case: What better way to move up and down a rock climbing tower than with some rope?
 

The limitations of realism

McCarthy used to ride dirt bikes when he was younger and often used a powerwasher to clean them after. While the act of cleaning was pleasant, there were a lot of annoying logistics that could get in the way. You have to worry about numerous cords and water usage, and there’s always the possibility of injuring yourself when dealing with high-pressure streams.

That’s why, despite leaning on reality for inspiration, FuturLab did make one feature less realistic for the sequel. In PowerWash Simulator, you had to purchase surface-specific cleaning liquids for particularly tough dirt. That finicky system has been swapped out for free soap in PowerWash Simulator 2 that both works on all surfaces and automatically refills as you wash it off. 

Buying soap is just one of those parts of the real-world powerwashing experience that gets in the way, and the joy of PowerWash Simulator is that it removes a lot of these pain points and focuses on the act of cleaning—and the inherent "satisfaction" that comes from it.

There were many aspects of powerwashing that FuturLab decided not to include. You don't have to worry about your clothes and boots getting filthy or any dirt backsplash. Powerwashing also has zero effect on the player character. There’s no fall damage or injuries to deal with.

Many of these areas of friction surprise players who then use a powerwasher in real life. "There was no 'negative' state for, say, damaging the paint on a building or blasting off plaster as a result of your cleaning," PowerWash Simulator player Dan Klein told the Epic Games Store. 

Another player, board game designer Sam (who asked for their last name not to be used) failed to account for how much muck would get on them while powerwashing a friend's backyard, something they were inspired to do after playing PowerWash Simulator. "The big surprise to me was how messy I got. As I was washing, a ton of dirt and junk flew back at me—there's a reason for those rubber suits, huh?" 

By looking to the community, FuturLab was able to avoid the pain points and better understand what makes powerwashing fun. That's why the contrast between the dirty and clean states is so high, or why finishing enough of a section will mark it as done regardless of whether you cleaned up every little spot. The chime that plays when you finish a section is like beautiful music, especially when you've been working on a job for a while. There isn't any gameplay that forces the player to clean up all the leftover dirt, and there are no consequences for using the wrong nozzle.

So when figuring out what to add to PowerWash Simulator 2, FuturLab had to focus on ways to improve the experience—and not what might make it more practical.

"As we were putting together the game and looking at the powerwashing community, I was getting to appreciate the inconveniences we took out," said McCarthy.

After going through the hassle of real-world powerwashing myself, it's a relief that I don't need to figure out where to plug in the actual powerwasher, or go over areas of a level multiple times to get all the dirt off. I went over my backyard three times because, after the first pass, we had to remove gallons upon gallons of dirt first. In PowerWash Simulator, you can just focus on cleaning, listen to those great sound effects, and watch dirt disappear—and hopefully experience the sense of satisfaction that FuturLab intended.

PowerWash Simulator 2 is available now on the Epic Games Store.