College Football 25: EA's Biggest Success or EA's Biggest Disaster?

The release of College Football 25 is fast approaching. The first college football game in 11 years, is set to be perhaps one of the most bought EA games they’ve had in quite some time. The game is causing much pressure on EA to sell well. If this doesn’t reach the critical reception of both the game being good and the low finances of the game, it could be down as one of EA’s biggest blunders they have ever done. But what would happen for both sides of this argument to succeed? Let’s see the arguments starting with the wrong side.

How Could This Be EA’s Biggest Disaster?

Whenever EA announces a new football game on social media, especially X, there’s one comment you expect to see: “It’s just a re-skin of last year’s game.” Yes, this does get annoying year after year, but they have an excellent point. EA seems never to learn its lesson and continues to make a similar game to the previous year’s titles, with some minor differences here and there. You’ll get some new modes sometimes, but for the most part, nothing changes except for the presentation and graphics. Many have pointed out that it’s because most of the money from the game comes from the Ultimate Team mode.

This could lead to a significant problem for the game. EA could recycle the files from Madden 25, swapping out the uniforms, logos, and other elements to create a college football-themed game. They could even introduce a mode like Ultimate Team under a different name, like with Teambuilder in NCAA 14. Add a few glitches, and you have the recipe for EA’s worst college football game. The backlash from such a move would be significant, potentially causing EA to incur substantial financial losses due to low sales. It could also affect Madden or its other sports franchises as untrustworthy that they’ll make a good game again. Let’s see how EA can make this a good match.

How Could This Be EA’s Biggest Success?

For College Football 25 to be a game-changer for EA, they need to step up their game and deliver a comprehensive gaming experience. A robust franchise mode with a plethora of options, a feature missing in the current Madden games, would be a great start.

Those features add the depth that’s been missing in sports video games for some time. As for other game modes, you can return Rode to Glory because it was one of the best modes of NCAA 14; if you don’t make any changes to that mode, you should be fine there. What I would like to see, in my opinion, is the return of College Classics mode. For those who don’t know, back in NCAA Football 2004 and 2005, College Classic modes featured classic moments you could replay and beat. Once you beat the moment, you get the pennant to unlock both teams to play in the game. It felt special because you had to earn the pennant. You can input it into the game and update it to play new moments during the season to keep it fresh. It was a simple mode, so EA should insert it into the game. If I had to add one more mode, it would be the mini-games mode from NCAA Football 10.

Another simple mode to add that had great mini-games like Bowling and Horse, for example.  While it may seem like I'm asking for old modes, that’s the thing with EA; they’ve focused on microtransactions and forgot that simple modes like these modes I mentioned work well. Presentation-wise, putting in unique traditions like Script Ohio for the Ohio State Buckeyes should be a requirement because touches like that help celebrate what this series is all about. If they can show stuff like this during the reveal in May, chances are more people will order the game and make it one of the most successful games in EA’s history.