It’s been 11 years, but a college football video game is finally releasing soon.
EA Sports College Football 25, the long-awaited entry in the renamed NCAA College Football video game series, will be launching worldwide on July 19, 2024. It’ll be the first college football video game since the release of 2013’s NCAA Football 14.
Developed by EA Orlando, the team has stressed in the past few months that this game is not just a re-skin of its NFL counterpart, Madden. Thanks to EA’s new Name, Image, Likeness (NIL) agreements — which compensate players for their in-game representation — the game will feature over 10,000 real college athletes for the first time in the series’ history. Additionally, College Football 25 will include all 134 FBS teams.
Mashable Top Stories
College Football 25 was first announced in February 2021 as a game that would happen at some point, with no definitive date. News of the game’s development was sparse until its teaser trailer in February of this year with a promise of a full reveal in the following months.
Both versions of the game’s cover have already leaked on the internet, with the Deluxe Edition seen earlier this month on Sony’s Playstation store. The Standard Edition was seen on various social media circles on X (formerly Twitter) and Reddit. Interestingly, both covers feature current college football players, whereas in years past the NCAA series would only use the likeness of recently graduated players. It makes sense though as EA has paid a hefty chunk of change for the NIL rights to college athletes across the country.
Featuring on the standard cover are University of Texas QB Quinn Ewers, University of Colorado athlete Travis Hunter, and University of Michigan RB Donovan Edwards. Reception online to the leaked covers has been mixed at best, with some disappointed that the design isn’t as cool as what they’ve envisioned in the years since the game was announced.
It’s still unclear how the actual game will play, however, EA plans on doing a full reveal of College Football 25 on Friday, May 17.