When I walked out of EA Sports' Orlando studio two weeks ago, I was overwhelmed. There was so much information about College Football 25, so much to explain. I called my editor and said there wouldn't be just one story about this trip. There would be at least three.
I've spent over 6,000 words on everything I learned about Road to Glory, from gameplay to Dynasty, to the names, images, and likenesses.
But there was more to talk about: I had tons of questions in the comments and on Twitter, from big topics to little things I never thought to ask, so I'll try to answer as many of them as I can before the game launches in July.
If there's one thing that came through in my visit, it's that this game is made by college football diehards who truly love the sport and everything that makes it unique, and they try to capture as much of that unique feel as they can. The game won't be perfect. There will probably be things you don't like. I was up close and personal with it. difficult Making a video game and how much work goes into it, but with this return you can be sure the game is in trustworthy hands.
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Now, on to the questions. Too many questions so I'll split it into two parts.
Note: Submitted questions have been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Is there any point in buying the Deluxe Edition if I'm only going to play Dynasty mode? — Robert D.
This opens up a good question. There are a lot of college football fans who have been away from gaming since NCAA Football 14. They may not know what these new terms like “Deluxe Edition” and “Ultimate Team” mode mean. Based on all the information I have gathered, the main benefits of purchasing the Deluxe Edition will be early access gameplay and increased Ultimate Team bonuses.
If you pre-order the Standard Edition, you'll get the game and the Ultimate Team Bonus Pack on July 19th, and if you pre-order the Deluxe Edition for an extra $30, you'll get the game on July 16th, the same Ultimate Team Bonus Pack, and 4,600 points (currency) for Ultimate Team.
So if you're just interested in playing Dynasty like in the old days, that $30 difference comes down to whether you want the game three days earlier. Some people I know say it's worth it. I'm in the middle of SEC Media Days that week and I'm busy, so I haven't decided which one to buy yet.
College Football 25 will be released in July. (Screenshots courtesy of EA Sports)
Was the coin toss done in-game or was it handled automatically like in Madden? — @michael_bryan14
This is a good question that should have been covered in the gameplay story. For those of you who haven't played Madden recently, there is no coin toss. Your preference for winning or losing the coin toss is set in the game settings (kick if you win, take the wind if you lose, etc.). This is true in college football as well. Overtime should be decided by a coin toss.
Are there any similarities between this game and Madden? If I develop a player to first round status in Road to Glory, can I use that same player in Madden's create-a-player mode? — Justin B.
you can You can export Road to Glory players to Madden's Superstar mode, Can not Exporting Draft Classes from Dynasty to Madden Franchise. The lack of exportable draft classes has generated more backlash than my original article, and the reason is simple: EA only licenses the likeness rights of players during their college years, and does not own their likeness rights after college. EA cannot legally allow players from college football into Madden.
Sure, college players join the NFL in the spring, and EA Sports has an NFLPA license to use the players, but not everyone joins the NFLPA. Marvin Harrison Jr. hasn't signed a group license with the NFLPA yet, and most college players aren't even that far away. At that point, the players are scanned by EA at the NFL Scouting Combine and put through the process of being added to Madden in the new game in the fall.
But you can develop a player in Road to Glory mode, have them play in college for four years, then move on to Madden's Superstar mode, where they'll go through the combine, get drafted, and have an individual pro career. I haven't played much Superstar mode so far, but maybe having Road to Glory players would make it more appealing.
Going deeper
I played two hours of College Football 25, and here's what I learned:
Any details on why EA isn't making the online Dynasty mode available cross-platform? — Jesse K.
From my understanding, this is something EA didn't get with the first version of the game. This is very important to me because I didn't want to spend over $400 on a PS5 for just one game, so I bought a cheaper Xbox. But I have friends with PS5s, and I can play against them and Road to the College Football Playoff games. I hope in the future we'll have cross-platform online dynasties like Madden.
In Dynasty mode, will the conference jersey patches change to the new conference? For example, if I put Florida State in the Big Ten, will the ACC patch be replaced with a Big Ten patch? Previously, I think the patch just changed to the NCAA logo. — Sam H.
I have heard that when a team changes conferences, the conference logo gets changed to the new conference everywhere including on the stadium field and on the jersey patches.
The topic started with lead senior game designer Christian Brandt showing off some very early stadium designs that were all gray and asking people to guess which stadium they were: When North Carolina was mentioned, Brandt mentioned the ACC logo on the field and said that if a school were to change conferences, all of their logos would change too.
If you can't play high schools in Road to Glory, how do you get to schools? Do you just pick one school or is there some sort of recruiting process at the start? Also, how are player ratings determined (1 star, 5 stars, etc.)? — Charlie L.
It's based on the choices you make at Startup. You get to choose a star rating, which affects your player's rating, ranging from a 2-star prospect (65 overall) to a 5-star prospect (79 overall). You also choose a position (QB, RB, WR, MLB, CB) and an archetype for that position. Depending on your star level, you get more mental abilities you can give to your player. Choose which recruiting pitch is most important to you: academic support, coach prestige, playing time, etc.
Based on your answers, you will receive offers from the schools that are best suited for you. You don't have to choose the best school, but that's the process.
While I've appreciated the detail and work that was put into Road to Glory in the past, I didn't really care for the high school part. I just wanted to touch on the college part. The developers looked at areas they could cut when building a new game from scratch, and that's why it was cut. If there's strong support from gamers, it could come back in the future. But this version of the RTG, which EA says will provide 10-20 hours of fun, should open up the game mode to a wider audience.
You mentioned that you can't edit the attributes of players you create, but does this apply to player stats as well? Not being able to go into the roster and make your favorite player a 99 etc seems like a potentially really bad thing. — Laker Hater W.
You can't edit the stats or appearance of real players — as EA Sports told us, without the real players there's no game — and there's really no reason not to allow it.
Honestly, the most common question I've been asked is whether you can edit shoulder pads and equipment on real players. This is something I never thought about or would ever ask, but I know it's a big deal for some people. I looked into it and the answer is “Yes, you can edit equipment on real players.”
Going deeper
How EA Sports addressed the NIL issue in College Football 25
Will the Team Builder website be launched before the game itself? — Beto G.
We don't know yet. We haven't heard any new information about Team Builder beyond what was originally announced. That's the hope, I'm sure.
Regarding Team Builder, I haven't received an answer as to whether you can use that mode to create FCS programs, but I suspect that licensing reasons prevent this.
Can we expect to see a lot of microtransaction features in Dynasty mode? For example, using your own real money to buy virtual currency to fund your school's NIL initiatives and use them to attract new and transfer students? — John K.
As explained last week, there are no NILs in Dynasty mode. There is no bidding on players. They act as player boosts in Road to Glory mode.
As for microtransactions, I'm not sure yet, but I do know that it's a major concern for modern gamers who are frustrated by how they've taken over gaming – an issue that wasn't addressed in EA Sports' lengthy presentation – and EA knows that a large portion of this audience just wants to play Dynasty and Road to Glory like they used to.
Ultimate Team will probably be microtransaction heavy, just like Madden, but it's not a game mode I care about, and I know other people really like it, but if you want to play this game like the old games, I believe you can do that without microtransactions.
Will there be an All-Time Team? It would be cool to see Stetson Bennett pass to Herschel Walker or Cam Newton pass to Bo Jackson. — Eric W.
I recently played NBA 2K and the option to use legendary or all-time teams was definitely pretty cool. But to make that happen in a college football game would be a massive undertaking as it would require many more licenses for those old teams. Ultimate Team will be able to add college football legends, but we don't know yet who those players will be.
Going deeper
What's in College Football 25's Dynasty mode? Everything we know
Is it not being released on PC? — Humberto C.
This game will not be on PC, and I think some people are disappointed about that. My brother is an avid PC gamer, but the only console he has is the Nintendo Switch. EA Sports has not commented officially, and Matt Brown of Extra Points wrote an interesting article on this last month. My understanding, based on conversations with people who work on this kind of thing, is similar to his understanding. That is, it's not worth it at this point. The game has been in the works for several years already, was delayed from its original goal last year, and is still being put together. And that's just for the PS5/Xbox version. Making a PC game is much more complicated, especially when you consider mods, anti-cheats, and license workarounds. It's true that EA Sports has been particularly strict in making sure that only players who opt in are in this game. That's why the focus was on next-gen consoles.
It's also true that College Football/NCAA has a much higher percentage of North American users compared to FIFA/FC's global audience or even Madden. And the majority of sports games in North America are on consoles. Could it become a PC game in the future? Possibly, especially if EA doesn't have to build the entire game from scratch. But there just wasn't the space or time for the first version of this game considering where the majority of the players for this title are located.
(Screenshots courtesy of EA Sports)
