Wear system can have huge limitations

I love EA College Football 25, but I'm starting to worry that the game will be negatively affected by the precarious tightrope the developers have to walk in order to comply with all the regulations that come with fielding NIL athletes.

The Wear and Tear system is brilliant in concept, but isn't this yet another area that will be weakened by the game's necessary commercial advancements?

Many know and have voiced their displeasure about the limitations of player editing. Users hoping to enjoy the same degree of player editing freedom they had with the old NCAA Football titles will be disappointed.

While we haven't been told what we can edit with players in the game, we know that users won't be able to fully edit all athletes.

The WAT system sounds so good, but if you read the Dynasty Mode blog and watch the deep dive video, you never hear Kirk Herbstreit mention the word injury. The word injury is used only once in the 85-page blog, and it's in this sentence from the Skill Groups section: Instead of developing each attribute separately, for example Trucking, players instead develop an entire Skill Group. A Skill Group is a collection of related attributes, for example the Running Back Power skill group includes Trucking, Strength, Stiff Arm, Toughness, Jumping, and Injury.

< position="inread" progressive="" ad-id="article-0-inread" aria-hidden="true" role="presentation"/>

It begs the question of whether players can actually get injured in Dynasty Mode. We know that players’ attributes take a hit when specific parts of their body take damage, but can a player be forced to miss a match(es) due to injury?

I'm starting to think that's been removed. The wording in the Wear and Team section is a bit more problematic. It says:

As described in the Deep gameplay divePlayers can sustain damage to body parts during the game. The more damage a body part is, the more it affects their performance on the field. In addition to playing on the field, players will also sustain wear and tear damage during SuperSim. Each week, players will repair a portion of their wear and tear damage. The amount of repair depends on how damaged the body part is. For example, let's say your running back severely damaged his right ankle in the previous game and only slightly damaged his left shoulder. The following week, you can expect his shoulder to be fully repaired and his ankle to be only slightly repaired. His ankle is something you'll want to keep an eye on in the next game.

There is never any mention of a player missing an entire game. Further down in the blog there is more ambiguous wording. It says:

To ensure players don't fall through in key late-season matches, we've established minimum requirements that players must always meet as the week progresses.

I dug into the gameplay a bit more, and there's more there that suggests players shouldn't miss a match due to injury.

If a player is really hurt on a particular play, expect him to sit out a play or two, maybe more, the blog says. Later in the game, the expectation is that the player will have to hold out.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not looking for players who will suddenly explode on the field or for players who tear their ACLs on every play, but injuries and the potential for missing games are part of all sports.

When there is wear and tear in the game, but the chance of an injury lasting longer than the current match is absent, it is more annoying than engaging.

I hope I'm reading too much into this concept and that injuries will function as they do in every other franchise mode. If that's not the case and the presence of real college athletes has forced the injury concept to be toned down, I hope there are sliders that can be set for each Dynasty mode to provide a more traditional experience.

Fans will likely still be excited about the return of college football to video games, but the overall product may still have some cracks.

College Football 25 releases on July 19 for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S.