Advanced Lawnmower Simulator

The player is presented with a choice of six lawnmowers, five of which are inoperative and cannot be used. Once the only operative lawnmower has been picked, the player then uses it to mow a lawn. There is only one key ("M"), and pressing it mows one square of lawn. After a lawn is completely mowed, the player is rewarded if it was done well enough. All lawns are identical.

After a few lawns have been mowed, the player gets killed automatically (according to Your Sinclair, the mower "hits a rock and blows up") and the game starts again.

Advanced Lawnmower Simulator was first conceived as a prank in the April 1988 issue of Your Sinclair. The piece claimed the player takes on the role of a Youth Training Scheme junior gardener with a lawnmower, a small toolbox and a can of petrol, and would be able to upgrade their equipment, including additional tools, more cans of petrol and more powerful "grassware". It also claimed that lawns get larger as the game progresses, have hidden traps such as stones, coat-hangers and duck-ponds, and later levels would be rose gardens. The supposed developer and publisher Gardensoft were introduced as "a brand new publishing house that looks set to carve quite a niche for itself in the simulations market", and the piece claimed that they were going to release more games in the coming months, including a spring-cleaning game, a washing-up simulator (including a drying-up simulator) and a laundrette simulator in which players supposedly have to clean bags of various colours and materials.

It was also stated that Advanced Lawnmower Simulator is "ACE!" 95. It was also awarded a nine out of ten and given the magazine's MEGAGAME accolade. An advertisement, which described the game as "The most advanced domestic chore simulation yet to hit the home micro!"

In 2008, Retro Gamer jokingly stated that Advanced Lawnmower Simulator "has been hailed as THE best game on the Spectrum", and made jocular judgements on the gameplay and graphics as "Outstanding" and "Excellent" respectively, and of the game as "a truly special experience".

Advanced Lawnmower Simulator appears on an IGN list of "Video Games You Won't Believe Somebody Made", and a Geek.com list of "Weirdest Simulation Games of All Time". Vice described the prank as "one of the strangest incidents in mainstream publishing".

Advanced Lawnmower Simulator has received a cult following and multiple remakes. The game inspired other tongue-in-cheek games with "simulator" in the title. It has been ported to the Amstrad CPC and Amiga.