For the past decade, the lack of college football video games has meant fans have never had the chance to play as the sport's biggest stars and have wondered just how good they could have been, but with the release of EA Sports College Football 25 next week, players won't have to wonder anymore.
EA Sports has teamed up with the NFL Players Association to bring current NFL stars back to their college days in College Football Ultimate Team, USA TODAY Sports confirmed ahead of the Ultimate Team mode's reveal on Tuesday.
The deal allows video game players to play as collegiate versions of NFL players who played in college before video games existed — Patrick Mahomes when he was stuffing the stat sheet at Texas Tech, Joe Burrow during his legendary season at Louisiana State, and Christian McCaffrey when he was running around the West Coast at Stanford. NFL players just starting out in the league, like CJ Stroud, Sauce Gardner and Puka Nacua, will also be available in Ultimate Team mode.
One Team Partners, the licensing group that managed the deals to put the likenesses of college football players into video games, was also involved in the process of putting NFL players into the games.
Ultimate Team is a mode in which players can create their own all-star team and compete against other users online. Praised for its originality and criticized for prioritizing in-game purchases, the mode is popular in EA Sports' NFL and EA Sports FC games.
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The last college football video game, NCAA Football 14, incorporated Ultimate Team when it was released in 2013. At the time, the mode focused primarily on college football and school legends, as accurate player likenesses were not part of the game. When the mode returns in this year's game, it will incorporate “current players and retired legends from the past” in addition to current NFL players.
The ultimate team announcement comes as EA Sports reveals more details about the highly anticipated game just days before its release. EA Sports will reveal the launch day roster on Wednesday, followed by the Road to Glory mode on Thursday. The game will release on July 19, with Early Access starting July 16.
When McCaffrey was announced as the Madden 25 cover athlete, he told USA Today Sports that he wished he could have appeared in the college football video game while playing for the Cardinals.
Now, at last, it's a reality.
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