I always tell people, ‘you can show me better than you can tell me.’
Using that same logic as I evaluate the upcoming College Football 25 from EA, it is clear that delivering a deep and immersive Dynasty Mode was essential to the developer’s mission for the rebooted series.
The statement has been made, no matter what happens over the next six months. However, one area of the game still seems unclear.
On Tuesday, EA released an 85-page blog to explain the massive mode, and quite honestly, it would be nearly impossible for me to cover everything the blog touched.
If you will be on a plane for the next four hours and looking for reading material, you can read the entire thing here.
Even if you’re not going to read the entire blog, you can understand how deep Dynasty Mode will be in College Football 25 by watching the six-plus minute trailer released simultaneously with the blog.
Rather than trying to regurgetate the blog, I’m going to focus on a few key points and concepts around the most significant areas of the reveal. I’ll also call out the area of the game that still needs to be better explained.
32 Users for 30 Seasons
Dynasty mode can be played online with up to 32 people, and that group can play 30 seasons together. I don’t know if a large group can stick it out that long, but it is nice to have the option.
If you and your friends can play five or six seasons together, it creates an experience you will remember for years. There will be fictional players who take on a life of their own.
I say this because I’ve had similar experiences with other sports games. Thanks to the College Football 25 Dynasty Mode depth, this experience could be arguably the best iteration of an online franchise mode we’ve ever seen.
12-Team College Football Playoff
College Football is introducing the new 12-team playoff system in real life. However, fans who grab EA’s game will have an opportunity to play with the future of the actual sport on their PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S.
I’m expecting to see a lot of season simulations, with users sharing the teams that went on to win the national championship dozens of times before the real college football season begins.
Recruiting and the Transfer Portal
If you played NCAA Football, you probably remember how good the recruiting system was in that game. I did tons of things with the recruiting system more than a decade ago, but what College Football 25 is delivering is miles ahead of what we had before.
More player tags add layers to the recruiting process. I hope to see some level of on-screen effects when you elevate into a recruit’s top three schools.
Something similar to the effects you see when you pull a big-time card in Ultimate Team would be an excellent reward for convincing a recruit to choose your school.
The transfer portal wasn’t a thing in 2013. In 2024, it has become the free agency market in college sports.
In College Football 25, this aspect of team management functions a lot like free agency, but recruiting high school players is still the best way to build a great team.
While I played four full games of College Football 25 during an early preview, I didn’t get a chance to use the recruiting engine.
Aside from the section below, this is the part of the game I’m most looking forward to playing on launch day.
Customization
While I am mostly over the moon about every aspect of College Football 25, I’m beginning to feel more concerned about the game’s customization with each passing reveal.
I’m aware that EA needed to reduce some of the customization options in the old NCAA Football games. That customization partially led to the game’s 10+ year absence.
While I accept the concept of limitation to have college football return, how bad is it?
The section on the much-anticipated Team Builder was minute when you consider how many words were written about Dynasty Mode overall. I can pop the entire section here, and it will barely elongate my post.
EA wrote this about TeamBuilder in the blog:
“TeamBuilder is back! You can import up to 16 TeamBuilder teams in a private Online Dynasty. The Commissioner must replace existing FBS schools with the TeamBuilder teams they want to add when setting up the dynasty. Including TeamBuilder schools is only available at the creation of the league, and they can only be used in private Online Dynasties, so make sure your Commissioner knows which school you want to use when getting the Online Dynasty started.”
The shortness of this section and the limitation to just 16 TeamBuilder teams are worrisome. In most instances, 16 would be more than enough, but considering the level of customization on all schools and players will be limited, the number seems a bit small.
You’re also not allowed to add teams through TeamBuilder once you’ve started your Dynast Mode.
This may not be as big of an issue as it seems, but we really need to know how much agency we will have with player and recruit editing. It is a significant part of the experience for many of us, and there are still too many unanswered questions.
