EA Sports Bringing Back College Football Game?

I don’t know precisely what this means, but I know a lot of people (myself included) are really, really excited about it.

To be clear, there’s no timetable for the above-implied college football video game’s release. A release prior to the 2021 college football season would be incredibly improbable. I’d expect 2022 at the absolute earliest.

What’s more, you’ll note there’s no mention of “NCAA Football” in the announcement, which seems to imply that there’s no formal agreement with the folks in Indianapolis regarding the contours of this thing. That includes no agreement on name, image, and likeness (NIL) of actual college football players.

The two above points are probably related. A longer development period gives the NCAA time to work out some sort of NIL plan before the game’s release. Releasing the game with amorphous, unnamed players at this point would be possible, but it would also likely provoke a lot of bad PR. In a way EA Sports is likely signaling that a NIL deal is coming, or at least that they’re confident one is coming. Otherwise look for 2020 Clemson to be quarterbacked by a 5’10 Samoan guy with bad hair named Levor Tawrence.

For now, we can all dream about a college football game that includes the College Football Playoff, play calling with updated playbooks and RPO functionality, and officials making semi-arbitrary targeting calls that shift the momentum of your Wofford dynasty. Until later...

Go ‘Dawgs!!!