It has been over a decade since NCAA Football 14 was released, and booting up EA Sports College Football 25 for the first time—with an awesome video narrated by Chris Fowler while showing iconic traditions in the sport—immediately brings up nostalgic feelings that carry throughout the entire playing experience.
First of all, it should be pointed out that College Football 25 is not at all a carbon copy of Madden. The gameplay is entirely different with a separate development team that worked on the game, and that’s not just empty talk. As someone that likes to begin with a Play Now game in the newest Madden every year, I wanted to do the same in CFB 25.
To my surprise, I got completely destroyed on All-American difficulty—throwing four interceptions with top-rated quarterback Shedeur Sanders in a 38-10 loss to Utah. But that is a good thing.
Basically, I jumped in as if it were a game of Madden, which would usually mean a close matchup at the very least, and perhaps even a dominating win. Utah has a tough defense, though, and I was not prepared for the adjustment of CFB 25, which features a new revamped passing mechanic among the changes for those who might be used to Madden or haven’t picked up the sticks since NCAA 14.
Still, I was not angry about the blowout loss. The authenticity of CFB 25 is what will make it a top-tier experience, and I could sense it from the jump—the band playing, an announce team of Fowler and Kirk Herbstreit, player movements, crowd noise, an authentic college pace for game play, and much more.
My tip for new and old players alike would be to hold off on immediately going into a Play Now game. Instead, take advantage of Practice and Mini-Games—which is the second thing I did after getting blown out with Colorado. After the passing Mini-Games where you need to hit targets to learn how to throw with timing, touch, and arc, the revamped passing setting made a lot more sense.
For anyone who might be confused by revamped passing, you don’t want to go for the top of the meter every time like shooting for perfect accuracy in a basketball game. The max power means throwing a bullet pass, and the less you hold the button, the more touch you will put on throws. I actually don’t pay attention to the meter, and just naturally throw with as much touch or power as I feel necessary—and be sure to use the left stick for expanded control (ex: pulling down on the stick to force a pass-catcher to come back to the ball).
After you at least do some of the Mini-Games, you should feel a lot more confident in passing and gameplay in general (tackling is the other main weakness I wanted to work on). The second Play Now game was a 28-17 win as Ohio State over Michigan State—an easier challenge—with star running back Quinshon Judkins leading the way. By the third game, I went with Alabama and lit up my CPU foe with Jalen Milroe, who has a beautiful virtual deep ball to match what he can do in real life.
So overall, my advice is to be patient and practice. The gameplay is very authentic and something that will take adjusting to, and that’s without even mentioning the Wear and Tear system that accumulates damage to players (something I took note of more in Dynasty) or Player Abilities to help differentiate players from one another and have them compare more to their real-life counterparts.
Two very minor gripes for Play Now would be the lack of options for weather—primarily choosing cold temperatures without snow—and start times for games not matching real-life times, as there is no 7:30 PM ET kickoff, which is when some of the biggest college showdowns begin.
I want to emphasize that these are very small issues considering it’s Play Now and not something that takes away from the authenticity of Dynasty or Road to Glory, but I wanted to at least point it out.
Dynasty Mode
It would be interesting to learn the time spent by the community in each game mode, but I would be shocked if Dynasty wasn’t the overwhelming favorite. Whether you want to start at the top by becoming the head coach at a Power 4 school or begin your journey as a coordinator at someplace like Kennesaw State, the depth of Dynasty Mode—from recruiting to messing with custom conferences—is awesome.
I know a lot of gamers decide to build up a smaller school into a powerhouse, but my preference is to start as an offensive or defensive coordinator and trying to work my way up the ranks. The experience of being pursued for open jobs at the end of every year is just as exciting to me as a down-to-the-wire thriller, and you have to make difficult choices—”Should I take the South Carolina job, or stay at Liberty and see if a job like Penn State or LSU becomes available next year?”
Of course, recruiting is a huge part of Dynasty Mode, and CFB 25 takes the depth to a new level. You need to allocate your scouting resources and find the most efficient way to recruit depending on where you are as a program. For example, a mid-prestige school such as Boise State might strike out on going for the top recruits—but maybe there is a five-star quarterback from Idaho that wants to stay close to home. If you play your cards right, you might just be able to convince him to come play for you.
Matching the changing landscape in college football, managing the transfer portal is the other huge aspect of building or maintaining a strong roster in Dynasty Mode. Even if you’d prefer to operate like Dabo Swinney by developing homegrown talent and not focusing on transfers, it’s imperative to keep players happy to make sure they don’t want to depart from your program. That means tracking player goals and keeping promises to earn their loyalty.
For gameplay, I am still tinkering with the settings to have the most realistic simulation experience. Ideally, we would be able to use 15-minute quarters, but the scoring and stats seem too high, and accelerated clock being at ten seconds might not give you enough time to make adjustments—especially in a tough road environment.
One idea I had was 15-minute quarters with accelerated clock at 20 seconds while being patient before snapping the ball. I just often find myself running the ball too much and turning on chew clock to move things along before the scoring gets out of control (or the game gets too long), so EA putting out official suggestions for realistic Dynasty settings would be great, but maybe not possible because everyone has different play styles.
I will be sticking to an offline dynasty, but Online Dynasty allows up to 32 users to play together, and the expanded College Football Playoff should lead to that being a ton of fun for those with a friend group (and time) to go head-to-head battles on the virtual gridiron for victories and recruits.
[While we have not encountered such issues, it should be noted that some have experienced too many CPU upsets and unrealistic poll rankings (for example, a three-loss Michigan team being at No. 1). We would expect a patch to fix these problem if a widespread occurrence.]
Road to Glory
I haven’t been able to spend a ton of time in Road to Glory because Dynasty is my priority, but the depth of the mode is on another level compared to NCAA 14—which was already an amazing experience more than ten years ago.
In CFB 25, you need to balance your life as a student-athlete by making decisions throughout your career, including attending class, focusing on NIL endeavors, and getting enough rest (remember, the Wear and Tear system is a factor). Whether you try to build a legacy at one school or decide to hop in the transfer portal, there are plenty of ways to set out on your football journey, and I would recommend reading the Road to Glory deep dive to get a full view on the mode.
I’ll just say if I were younger, it’s something I might even play before Dynasty Mode, and I love that you can import your player into Madden 25 to continue your career at the professional level.
Everything Else
Dynasty and Road to Glory are the tentpole modes in CFB 25, but many will be spending much of their time playing College Ultimate Team. While not something that interests me because of how much time I want to spend playing Dynasty Mode, “CUT” will feature current and former college stars, with guys like Ray Lewis and Nick Bosa already featured. A throwback Tim Tebow or Tavon Austin card might be enough to lure me in for a bit.
Road to the College Football Playoff is the online head-to-head mode in CFB 25 where you play quick matchups and climb the ranks towards the playoffs, and I hope this is something that expands into an offline mode for future years—maybe giving a group of friends the opportunity to compete over a weekend.
Finally, I want to emphasize the authenticity of College Football 25. We get expansive playbooks for each school, 150 stadiums, dynamic attendance (and fans that will react positively or negatively based on the action), seasonal attire for fans (we’ll see them go from painted chests to padded jackets—if necessary—as the season progresses), two different announce teams, detailed shadows during the day that will adjust as the game progresses, and much more.
Most importantly, College Football 25 nails the college atmosphere. Even something as simple as the band playing while scrolling through menus makes me feel as if it’s a Saturday morning in September. From a White Out at Penn State to Notre Dame tapping their ‘Play Like A Champion Today’ sign, the care taken to realistically portray the pageantry and traditions is clear, and it’ll be a blast to experience it all.
Conclusion
With realistic gameplay, in-depth Dynasty and Road to Glory modes, and a supreme sense of nostalgia you get as soon as you pick up a controller, EA Sports College Football 25 is the best sports video game in years.
Score – 9.1