EA’s college football video game returns in July after an 11-year hiatus

polygon.com:

We finally know when we’re going back to school: EA Sports College Football 25 is scheduled to launch July 19, publisher Electronic Arts announced Thursday.

EA also officially released the game’s cover artwork, which had leaked online last week, confirming that College Football 25 will feature three current players on the box: Texas Longhorns quarterback Quinn Ewers, Colorado Buffaloes wide receiver/defensive back Travis Hunter, and Michigan Wolverines running back Donovan Edwards.

This is the first time that active college athletes will grace the cover of an EA Sports game, EA said in a news release. And thanks to the new post-2021 landscape in college sports, where athletes can be compensated for the use of their name, image, and likeness, the game publisher is paying each of this year’s cover stars for the appearance. (Edwards, Ewers, and Hunter have each published sponsored Instagram posts in partnership with the official EA Sports College Football account.)

Developed, as before, by Madden NFL studio EA Tiburon, the game will be released on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. The lack of a Windows PC version is notable, since EA has been releasing Madden on PC since 2018. But it’s unlikely to dampen the anticipation and enthusiasm around College Football 25 all that much, considering how long fans have been waiting for this beloved video game franchise to return.

It’s been more than a decade since EA shelved the series, then known as NCAA Football, amid a flurry of class-action lawsuits alleging that EA, the NCAA, and the Collegiate Licensing Company (an organization representing the schools that appeared in the game) profited from their use of collegiate athletes’ likenesses without paying them. This arrangement existed due to long-standing NCAA bylaws that characterized the players as “student-athletes” — as opposed to professionals — and forbade them from receiving any compensation for the use of their names, images, or likenesses (NIL). In separate litigation,