There are a lot of simulators out there, some of which cater to niche audiences. One of those simulators is Winter Resort Simulator, which has already had two iterations of the game.
If you ever played Ski Region Simulator all the way back in 2013, made by Giants Software (who now made the popular Farming Simulator series), the games can very much be compared. You take on the role of managing a ski resort, and keeping the slopes open for guests.
A big part of Winter Resort Simulator is the cable cars or gondolas. Again, this fills a very niche market, but it does it really well, creating in depth gondola systems users can control.
However, in both Winter Resort Simulator 1 and 2, there are two major issues:
- Performance
- Graphics
- Lack of console support
So let’s dive into what we know so far about Winter Resort Simulator 3, and if any of these issues will be resolved in the new version.
Graphics – The switch to Unreal Engine 5
There’s great news in this department. Winter Resort Simulator 3 has been announced to be moving to Unreal Engine 5, and just from the screenshots we’ve seen so far, the visual quality has majorly improved. Here are a couple screenshot comparisons just showing how big the visual improvements are.
Winter Resort Simulator 2 (before):
Winter Resort Simulator 3 (after):
Winter Resort Simulator 2 (before):
Winter Resort Simulator 3 (after):
Needless to say, the environment looks a lot better.
The developers state that the switch over to Unreal Engine 5 was one that was carefully considered, as the first two instalments of the game were developed with Unity. They mention that they believe the switch to Unreal Engine 5 will allow them to overcome the technical limitations that held them back in the previous title(s).
They’ve also noted that thanks to Unreal Engine 5’s level streaming, worlds/maps can now be much larger, with distant areas being unloaded to significantly improve performance, something that the older title did not do.
It’s also worth mentioning here that this isn’t the developer’s first game with Unreal Engine, as they’re the same developers behind the SubwaySim series.
Console Support
While we don’t have too much information on the exact systems Winter Resort Simulator 3 will be released on, we do know that they’ve confirmed a console version of the sim, as the main steam store page for WSR3 states “Announced for Winter 2026 on PC and consoles“. I expect we’ll learn more about this closer to the release, seeing as it’s still over a year out from the time of this article.
Performance
Onto the big question: Will performance be improved? Given we haven’t seen any gameplay footage yet this one’s hard to say, though, the improvement on world streaming that we mentioned previously should hopefully help a lot in this area. It’s also important to note that with the game still being over a year out, if we do see some in-game footage in the coming months it’s likely to be an early developer build where not all performance optimization have been made.
This is something we should hopefully learn more leading up to release.
Modding
Modding was and continues to be a big part of Winter Resort Simulator 2, and it seems like the upcoming game will provide the same, if not better, level of tools. We again don’t have much to go off at this point, but we know from the store description that in-depth modding tools will be available, and they will support both custom vehicle creation and custom mission creation. We suspect they’ll also support all the existing features in WRS2, but this hasn’t been confirmed yet.
Confirmed Features
We’ve made a condensed list of all the confirmed features of Winter Resort Simulator 3 that we’ve so far seen from the store page and developer announcements, and they’re as followed:
- Engine switch to Unreal Engine 5
- Major graphical improvements
- Sophisticated operation of cablecar/gondola systems, just like in the previous games.
- A newly designed game world with a significantly expanded size compared to previous titles
- In-depth modding support (With vehicle and mission support)
- Singleplayer and Multiplayer
- Console Support
- Fully licensed snow cannons along with artificial snow mechanics
- Economy
- Missions
- Redesigned ropeways, with several new types of lifts and stations, all fully licensed.
And that about sums up all the details we know when it comes to Winter Resort Simulator 3. The developers have stated that they’ll be keeping the community in the loop during the development process, providing us with regular insights into the development, and we’ll be right here to deliver that news to you.
