College football players from all 134 Football Bowl Subdivision teams can opt in to be a part of EA Sports College Football 25 beginning Thursday, officially setting the athletes up to be compensated for being in the video game for the first time.

EA Sports announced Thursday morning that all 134 FBS teams will be in the game, including soon-to-be FBS member Kennesaw State. OneTeam Partners will handle the players’ group licensing for the game and is also set to announce Thursday that players will be able to opt in through Learfield’s COMPASS NIL app.

An EA Sports spokesperson told The Athletic that every player who opts in will receive $600 and a copy of the game (a $70 value). A number of college athletes, both within football and outside of it, will also become ambassadors for the game and receive additional NIL compensation. Players who do not opt in will be represented with a generic player avatar, as Barry Bonds famously was in many MLB video games. With more than 11,000 players expected to be in the game, this is believed to be the largest group NIL partnership of its kind. (For comparison, the NFL has around 1,700 players on active rosters at a given moment during the season.)

The game is set to be released this summer.

Players will be encouraged to opt in by April 30 to guarantee their place in the first iteration of the game, a OneTeam spokesperson said; the earlier players opt in, the earlier they can receive their payment. Unlike in pro video games, players won’t have their faces scanned, in part due to the sheer number of players. Information and images will be pulled from team rosters. While Air Force, Army and Navy players are not allowed to accept NIL deals and payments, they are expected to be in the game.

OneTeam Partners has worked with EA Sports for years, handling the group licensing with the NFL Players Association for Madden and with MLS and NWSL for EA Sports’ soccer titles. OneTeam previously partnered with the COMPASS NIL app for Fanatics’ college football jersey group licensing deal.

“Including players in the return of the EA Sports College Football franchise guarantees they receive their direct benefits,” OneTeam Partners senior vice president Shelbi Hendricks said in a release. “Our partnership with industry leaders like EA Sports and (Collegiate Licensing Company) focuses on authentic representation, underscoring the crucial role current players play in shaping the game.”

This official announcement closes the loop on one of the first major NIL controversies. It’s been 11 years since EA Sports last released a college football game. Lawsuits over players’ inability to profit off their NIL more than a decade ago focused heavily on the video games, in which nameless players had the same numbers, measurables and hometowns of the real athletes.

Former UCLA basketball player Ed O’Bannon, the plaintiff in the landmark antitrust lawsuit against the NCAA for forbidding players to profit off the use of their likenesses in the game, said he didn’t want college sports video games to stop — he just wanted players to be compensated. EA Sports also said in court filings at the time that it was willing to pay players. But the NCAA wouldn’t allow it. EA Sports eventually settled with the plaintiffs before the trial, and the game stopped being produced out of litigation concerns. More than 29,000 athletes received a share of $40 million, an average of around $1,200 that varied based on players’ usage in the game.

EA Sports announced in February 2021 that a college football video game would return, and NIL rules passed that summer opened the door for real players to be in it. Later in 2021, Notre Dame said it wouldn’t allow its logos to be used in the game unless players were compensated for being a part of it. The Fighting Irish will be in this game, along with the other 133 FBS schools.

EA Sports College Football 25 will be fully revealed in May before its summer release. Some game details are already known. Sources involved in the game say it will be built on the Madden engine but won’t be a reskin of Madden. Dynasty Mode and Road to Glory will be the featured modes once again. A transfer portal is expected as well. Schools have submitted thousands of assets to EA Sports over the past three years, including stadium photos, jerseys, crowd cheers and more. College Football Playoff imagery will be used, a CFP spokesperson said Wednesday, and developers continue to plan for every possible detail and change to the sport before the game’s release.

“It’s the first game I’ll get to play as myself,” Kansas quarterback Jalon Daniels told The Athletic last fall. “I play NCAA ’14 with the revamped rosters, but to say there’s an actual game with me in there that I didn’t have to create, it’s gonna be exciting.”

(Photo courtesy of EA Sports)