EA Sports announces college basketball video game return targeting 2028 release: Source

Following the smashing success of the college football video game’s revival, EA Sports is going to bring back the college basketball game after almost two decades away.

The company teased the news Monday in a social media post. EA Sports last released a college basketball game in 2009.

The announcement came right as Extra Points reported about the game’s impending return, based on documents obtained by the newsletter that noted the Collegiate Licensing Company had recommended accepting EA Sports’ bid for the game over other game developers.

The target date for a return is 2028, with both men’s and women’s teams in the game, according to Extra Points’ Matt Brown. A source briefed on the matter confirmed that reporting to The Athletic.

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The CLC, which handles branding licenses for the vast majority of schools, put out its Request For Proposal to game developers in November 2024 following the success of College Football 25. EA Sports was the only one to confirm it would include all Division I men’s and women’s teams that opted in, which would total 730 teams, as well as NIL money for players on each team in a standalone simulation game. Schools have until July 18 to approve being in the game, the source said.

The plan would be similar to football, running NIL through OneTeam Partners, and EA would explore similar features to the College Football game, like Dynasty Mode, Team Builder, Road to Glory and Ultimate Team.

The six-year proposal includes at least three games, beginning in 2028. It could produce six games in that time, but if it did not produce a game in a given year, teams and rosters would be updated in a downloadable patch. Similar to College Football, schools will be allocated more royalties based on how often their team is used.

The history of the football and basketball video games are closely tied. The football game ceased publication after 2013 due to a lawsuit over use of name, image and likeness from Ed O’Bannon, a former UCLA basketball player who was portrayed on a historic team in NCAA Basketball ’09. EA Sports said in a court filing at the time it was willing to pay the athletes, but the NCAA wouldn’t allow it.

However, even before the football game was discontinued, 2K Sports and EA Sports ceased development of their college basketball video games in 2008 and 2009, respectively, due to declining audience and sales. The college football video game always outpaced the basketball games by a 3:1 margin in sales. The most units a college basketball game sold was 370,000, while college football typically sold around 1 million.

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However, when College Football 25 became the highest-selling sports video game ever in total dollars, after 11 years away, schools’ appetite to make another game was there, and EA Sports jumped in.

The reason for such a long delay between the game proposal and the game’s release is how long it takes to acquire assets and create stadiums, jerseys, trophies and more. EA Sports announced the College Football return in 2021 but didn’t release the game until 2024, which was a year later than initially planned, because of how long it took to build a new game from scratch.

College Football 26 will be released on July 7.

The Athletic asked EA Sports in January about the idea of bringing the college basketball game back. Senior vice president Daryl Holt wouldn’t tip his hand, but noted the success of football had gotten a lot of attention.

“As developers, we try to figure out how we can get creative on reaching other aspects of sports, whether that be a smaller sport or one that doesn’t have a game,” he said. “… We’ll keep looking for those things, but as a developer and working in sports, you’re always tapping your head going, what else could be possible?”

(Photo: Thomas Fuller / SOPA Images / LightRocket via Getty Images)

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