EA Sports
It’s been close to a decade since EA Sports dropped NCAA Football 14, which was the latest iteration in a beloved video game franchise that could trace its roots back to 1993—and also its last.
College football fans may have taken the series for granted at the time, but their appreciation only increased after the company behind it announced it was abandoning the title thanks to the landmark Supreme Court ruling that forced it to move from the world of amateur athletics.
When the NIL Era arrived after the NCAA was forced to shift its stance when America’s highest court ruled against them yet again, it didn’t take long for people to wonder if EA Sports would be getting back in the NCAA Football saddle.
The publisher had already expressed interest in doing exactly that prior to the aforementioned decision, and in 2021, it officially announced it was bringing the franchise back from the dead.
While the initial goal was to reboot the series in 2023, EA Sports announced it had decided to push the release back one more year, which means NCAA Football fans will likely have to wait until the summer of 2024 to get their long-awaited fix.
While details concerning the game’s development have been fairly promising, it’s also been surrounded by a fair amount of skepticism thanks to EA’s approach to some of its other sports franchises, which (to put things kindly) has left a lot to be desired in recent years.
Thankfully, Ari Wasserman of The Athletic may have assuaged some of those fears.
During a recent appearance on The Andy Staples Show, Wasserman said EA Sports tapped him to consult on the title (especially when it comes to the recruiting mechanics), and he addressed one of the major fears while discussing how it will differ from another football game EA Sports is known for.
Here’s what he had to say:
“They’re doing it in a way where you’re not just going to get a Madden engine with the college uniforms.
Like, they are really trying, and I think the reason why they delayed it a year was that they wanted to make sure that when the game finally made its return that it wasn’t just some knockoff of Madden and that it was its own thing.
The Dynasty Mode and recruiting and rankings and all the things that we talk about on this show are going to be represented to some extent in the video game.”
Given the hype surrounding the upcoming release, EA Sports will be committing an unforced error for the ages if NCAA Football fails to live up to expectations, so here’s to hoping things go smoothly.