REVIEW: ‘EA SPORTS College Football 25’ Captures The Beauty Of College Football (PS5)

When NCAA Football 14 was released in July 2014, no one expected the series to shut down just a few months later. Due to legal issues with players and their name, image, and likeness (NIL) being used without compensation, the popular franchise went on an indefinite hiatus. Now, 11 years later, the series has been revived with EA SPORTS College Football 25.

The world of college football is dramatically different than it was 11 years ago. Players can now make money off of their own name and NIL deals are rampant throughout the sport. The transfer portal, launched in 2018, and new transfer eligibility rules allow players to switch teams more easily than ever before. These major factors have changed the shape of college football, and EA SPORTS College Football 25 is tasked with replicating that new landscape on the digital front.

EA SPORTS College Football 25 implements the NIL system primarily in the Road to Glory game mode. Road to Glory allows players to create their own player and lead them to the promised land. Along the way to winning championships, players can sign NIL deals that boost their social media following and can have an impact on their stats and attributes. Choosing to accept a deal or not impacts the energy players have to work on other things like their GPA, an important part of staying eligible on the field, or gaining more coach trust or experience.

All of these decisions try to make players understand what it feels like to be an actual college football player. Do you want to cheat on a test in order to spend more time working out? Go for it! Just don’t be surprised if it backfires in the long run or if you get caught. All of the scenarios, including NIL deals, are very generic, but they do the job and add an interesting layer to the Road to Glory gameplay.

The bulk of Road to Glory though is actual results on the field. Players can choose to start as any level of prospect, from a five-star stud to a low-ranked player trying to work his way up. You can be the backup at a powerhouse like Alabama or Ohio State, biding your time until the starting job is yours, or go to a smaller school with the hopes of transferring to a bigger one after a successful season. Leading a team like Northern Illinois to a MAC Championship might open up the option to transfer to a school like Michigan or Penn State if you play your cards right.

This is where the transfer portal factors in. At the end of each season, you can enter the portal and explore your options. Factors like coaching style, playbook, and whether or not you can be a starter are all shown here. There is also a program fit rating that helps players know if a school is a good choice on the field or not. It was really cool to enter the portal for the first time and see the overwhelming amount of options, and it’s tough to choose the right one. The portal is not as in-depth on the Road to Glory side as it is in Dynasty mode, but it is still another great way to experience at least a semblance of what the portal is like for real players.

Road to Glory is a great game mode and worth checking out, but Dynasty is the real bread and butter of EA SPORTS College Football 25. In Dynasty mode, players take on the role of either the head coach, offensive coordinator, or defensive coordinator of any of the 134 teams available in the game. Every coach has their own skill tree which is used to develop what type of coach they are going to be. For example, you can choose to focus on player development, sacrificing some of your recruiting skills in the process. It’s a delicate balance, especially as a head coach, since all of the available coach abilities can play a vital role in turning your program into a powerhouse.

Recruiting is arguably the most important part of EA SPORTS College Football 25 and a lot of time was spent making this process as in-depth as possible. Scouting high school prospects and evaluating their skill is important. The hard part is convincing them to come play for you. Everything from conference prestige to campus lifestyle plays an important role in attracting the best players in the country. Some of these factors can be improved by winning, but others like proximity to home can’t be changed for obvious reasons.

There are only so many “hours” that can be spent recruiting players too. These have to be spread over a number of recruits, and it makes for a real puzzle to master the right approach. Smaller approaches like sending a DM on social media (yes, really) take up fewer hours but also have a lower impact. Events like scheduling a visit and delivering a hard sell pitch eat away at the hours but are more likely to have a bigger impact.

The recruiting system is fantastic in its depth and challenge. In theory, there are 133 other schools all fighting over the same player pool, so some prospects are much harder than others to get. It was frustrating to have a four-star prospect seemingly locked up only for a powerhouse to come in at the last minute and sweep them away. Weeks of strategy can be undone in minutes, making the process feel as chaotic as it is in real life.

The third major game mode is Ultimate Team, a staple of every EA SPORTS game. Ultimate Team is what it is, players earn cards that represent current and former players and can be used to create, you guessed it, their ultimate team to take on other players online. Ultimate Team charges real money for currency used to buy packs, but these packs can also be earned just by playing the game mode. If you are a fan of Ultimate Team there is plenty to enjoy here, but the Dynasty and Road to Glory modes have more to offer.

There is also the more competitive online Road to the CFP mode. In this mode, players compete against each other online to qualify for an online College Football Playoff and move up the ranks. Having a ranked online mode is neat, but not something I spent much time with and will probably not go back to. It’s great for those itching to prove their skills online though and should be plenty challenging.

And then of course there is just the standard quick play either by yourself or online against a friend. This is the mode where friendships are ended and sibling rivalries are taken to new heights. The sheer amount of teams to choose from means there is always something to find here for any type of player. There is just something special about being able to roll up as a team like Kennesaw State and demolish your arrogant friends. Or, you know, be that arrogant friend and get crushed.

Having those different game mode options is great, but none of that would be worth it if EA SPORTS College Football 25 didn’t absolutely knock it out of the park with the way it brings the actual game to life. The gameplay is so fluid and dynamic that playing it feels like kicking back on a Saturday night and watching the madness unfold on TV. Rating differences between players and teams are dramatic, leading to more impressive moments and some jaw-dropping highlights.

The biggest gameplay change is the introduction of the wear and tear system. The more hits a player takes, the more their body breaks down. The way EA SPORTS College Football 25 handles this is by having certain body parts that take damage, bringing down a player’s stats along with it. Your star running back won’t be as fast if he keeps taking hits to the legs, so it makes substitutions and player rest so much more important.

Other mechanics like a fluid stick system for precision jukes and option plays allow players to really encapsulate the college football feel. It was so fascinating to see the smallest movement of the stick reflected in a tight juke move to send my running back running 75 yards free to the end zone. These systems, along with new and more complex passing and kicking mechanics, add depth and challenge to the game like never before and make it feel as lifelike as ever.

The stadiums are brought to life with intricate detail. Team entrances and stadium traditions are present everywhere and make every game feel like a true event. College football is all about tradition and history and EA delivered with incredible accuracy here. Seeing a White Out in Happy Valley or a nighttime rocket launch at a UCF game makes players feel like they are living out the actual experience and not sitting and playing a video game.

Home field advantage really matters too. The stadium pulse meter measures how loud a crowd is and that has a profound impact on the gameplay. It affects everything from seeing the play call to knowing which button to press for a specific receiver. There are player skills that can mitigate these factors, but they never truly go away. Playing a tough game on the road in a place like LSU’s Death Valley is part of what makes college football special and EA SPORTS College Football 25 once again nails it here by creating those terrifying and difficult environments.

There are only a few small gripes with EA SPORTS College Football 25. The in-season ranking systems for teams during Road to Glory and Dynasty mode can be pretty wonky. I came up against an Alabama team that was 6-5 and somehow still ranked 10th in the country, and more often than not the College Football Playoff was heavily weighted towards a specific conference, though the conferences would vary. I would hope the algorithm determining these rankings gets looked at soon, but it is not always an issue and certainly not a dealbreaker.

While the on-field action is stunning, it is jarring to see incredibly low-detailed crowds that look and feel just like they did 11 years ago. Having campus-specific chants and crowd events is cool, but it would be nice if they looked a little bit nicer. And the marching bands, a staple of college football, don’t look great. Having them all move out of step, a giant no-no in the band world, during pre-game events was certainly a choice.

Those issues are very minor in the grand scheme of things, and it is easy to overlook them with how electric the gameplay is. This is the type of game that is impossible to put down because of the countless opportunities it gives players to create their own college football story. Future iterations of the franchise should build on this and make it even better, and they certainly have a great baseline to work from.

EA SPORTS College Football 25 adeptly brings the joy and chaos of college football to life in a breathtaking way. Nothing has ever captured that gameday feel quite like this and fans should rejoice that the franchise they know and love is back and better than ever for them and new generations to enjoy.

EA SPORTS College Football 25 is out now on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S