Season 4 of the popular shooter is close now, and the team has indeed given us a closer look at what to expect. Two new maps are coming, with Tsuru Reef being the first to drop. This one’s got a lot of open spaces and opportunities for you to support ground assaults from the skies and seas, and is sure to have you and your opponents wondering where an attack could come from next. There’s also Wake Island, and everything it’s bringing to the table alongside new vehicles and ways to cause mayhem as you execute your strategy.

Both maps make it challenging to navigate the waters you’re sailing through. Dynamic weather systems make sailing the open seas a danger all on their own, as you’re going to have to contend with waves that could throw off your aim, or even act as shields against enemy fire if you play your cards right.

The EF-88 and the Carbine are new weapons being added to the fray, and they’re quite potent tools to have in your arsenal from what we’re seeing. All in all, there’s a lot to look forward to in the new season, and we can’t wait to ride out the waves in a desperate bid for survival.

The well-regarded leaker has also reported that an Ultimate Edition version of the game will be available, offering 8 days of advanced access. A similar bonus is also expected to be available to EA Play subscribers. This advanced access would start on September 17th. More details, such as an official trailer, gameplay changes over EA Sports FC 26, and cover athletes, are expected to be revealed next week.

In Europe, the PC and Nintendo Switch 2 versions of EA Sports FC 27 are expected to be priced at €69.99, and the PS5 and Xbox Series X/S versions will reportedly be priced at €79.99. In the US, all platforms will seemingly have the same price tag – $69.99. Physical copies that include the game disc will also be available for PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.

The reported September 25th release date for EA Sports FC 27 plays into the company’s tendency to stick to strict release schedules regarding its sports games. Similarly, last year’s entry was unveiled in July 2025, which indicates that we will see a similar announcement for this year’s entry soon.

The last major update for EA Sports FC 26 brought with it a celebration of the World Cup. The update, titled The World’s Game, was released in May and added a 28-team international tournament mode to the game. New teams were added as well, including 53 fully licensed playable national teams, out of which 41 participated in the real-life World Cup. Two teams that weren’t licensed – Egypt and Japan – were also included, albeit with authentic players. Five generic squads were brought in for Algeria, Curaçao, Iran, Iraq, and Jordan.

“National team inclusion depends on our ability to secure licensing rights directly and comply with applicable laws and regulations, including U.S. sanctions, which may limit our ability to partner with certain federations,” explained the company.

EA Sports FC 26 is available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Nintendo Switch, and Nintendo Switch 2. In our review, we gave it a score of 8 out of 10 thanks to the addition of Competitive and Authentic modes, variety in its Career mode, and better balance of different styles. However, we also criticized the minor changes it introduced over EA Sports FC 25 and the redundant nature of the Unexpected Events feature.

For more information, check out our guides on its Career mode, how you can farm coins quickly, and how you can unlock and level up all 13 archetypes. And just in case you’re curious, here are the 13 biggest differences between EA Sports FC 26 and its predecessor.

But despite EA acknowledging that it “missed the mark” with paid progression systems that felt like they were there to replace something that was never a problem to begin with, we’re not entirely sure the studio has taken the right lessons away from the metaphorical conversation this time around. There wasn’t a clear promise that paid progression was not going to be a part of gameplay systems that were crucial to the experience, for starters.

But we’re getting ahead of ourselves. We’re going to tell you what we think about the situation, and what we’d say are good things to keep in mind when College Football 28 eventually comes around. What’s happened now might just be step one in determining what happens next, after all.

The Cause and Effect

We understand how harmless DLC or cosmetics and the like are good ways to monetize games like CF27, and the studio might not have drawn as much flak as it has if that were the case. But to have paid progression in modes that were specifically built around investing time into a player or coach felt tantamount to the studio treating its game’s best features as an inconvenience that could be brushed aside with a bit of cash.

Road to Glory is a good place to start, since it takes a few seasons if you decide to opt for natural progression. But the option to buy skill points outright negates the journey that those seasons can bring, which has definitely been worth it in the years since the franchise rose out of dormancy. The same goes for Online Dynasty, where Coach Points are available to purchase if you want a leg-up in a mode that’s definitely fun, but treats maxing out your Coach as a reward earned the hard way. Yes, it’s more satisfying that way, especially with the new systems it brings, but does everybody have the time and ability to get there without pay-to-win principles at play?

On its own, their existence in CF27 wouldn’t have us frowning at where the franchise might go next, despite pop-ups that feel like they’re almost encouraging us to throw a little cash at the game to chop away at a few hours of fairly well designed single-player modes. It was as if EA was willing to sacrifice some of the game’s best features on the altar of Ultimate Teams, a mode where microtransactions were at least accepted.

We couldn’t help but feel the studio crossed a line by trying to encourage quicker progression on its single-player options which would ultimately leave Ultimate Team as the logical next stop. That it comes at the cost of its single-player options is egregious, with reports of faster XP sliders for coaches being dropped, and more concerning ones about a veil of secrecy surrounding the addition of pay-to-win options for RTG and Dynasty showcasing the sale of a relief from progression systems designed to work in favor of maximizing monetization by making two of its best modes feel like uphill battles instead of naturally progressing careers.

The fact that Ultimate Team has long been a high earner for EA showcases that the backlash its receiving isn’t because of in-game purchases, but because those optional purchases were cutting into a progression loop that was their very core mechanic, and the reason for playing them without skipping beats. The inclusion of paid progression systems was a blow to the perceived balance that these modes brought to the table, with doubts that it could have been better tuned instead of being deliberately slower to make paid shortcuts be a tempting option.

Ultimate Team is probably a good place for paid progression, since transactions there feed back into its gameplay loop and an established business model. But putting similar options into modes like Dynasty and Road to Glory felt like they were corrupting the reason for their very existence, and of course, the voices that mattered most rose up in a roar that might have filled a stadium, with tactics that made EA sit up and take notice.

Community imposed Consequences

The #CFBPlayDontPay campaign was probably among the first instances of public, organized backlash we came across when looking into what others had to say about the things we found wrong with RTG and Dynasty’s progression purchases. Individual players expressed a staunch refusal to buy purchase points, or even straight up stop playing the game.

Steam reviews can always become battlegrounds for a game’s future, and EA was probably unhappy with how they coincided with wider launch-week coverage that brought complaints that went beyond the early impressions of a hardcore College Football community engaging with it after Early Access on premium editions opened up. There was even criticism on EA’s own official forums, some of them supporting the hashtag with specific objections to RTG and Dynasty’s sneaky stowaways. Scattered criticism might have been easy for the studio to absorb, but a demand that was as clear and unified across the board as the one that has emerged is a lot harder to brush off.

We didn’t want cheaper rates on purchase points, or improved earning rates. We wanted pay-to-win systems in Dynasty and Road to Glory gone altogether, which was quite the ask. But it did ensure that EA couldn’t get away with vague promises of balances or patches down the road, but was forced to address the problem on its players’ terms or risk losing a significant chunk of them altogether across other franchises too. Well, it has since responded. And while the lot of us should pat ourselves on the back, we believe that paying close attention to what’s been said is an important part of realising what hasn’t.

Yes, the studio said that paid options didn’t deliver the value and expanded choice it had intended for players. That’s all well and good, but it went on to say that its plans for CFB 28 and beyond included live-service features that were valuable, and that it would be more transparent about telling us about them. Those are steps that seem to address a problem that doesn’t exist instead of the one that’s right in front of it.

It was never about the perceived value of paid progression, or the lack of transparency in telling us about it. Those were just symptoms of the larger problem, which was that they did not belong in modes like RTG and Dynasty to begin with. But EA didn’t talk about that, and didn’t assure us that gameplay advantages are going to be permanently separate from the ability to purchase them, or that microtransactions are going right back to Ultimate Team where they belong. That the studio has not acknowledged that is why we think we need to keep a close eye on College Football 28.

Why is that? Glad you asked!

The Winds of Change

We’re hoping that EA learns that core progression in titles that comes at the asking price of one like CF27 should not be monetized in its single-player offerings. We’re equally worried that all it’s going to do is just announce them earlier and speed up progression just about enough to make it look like it isn’t deliberately slow, ditch the pop-ups, lower prices on bundles and include more value in them, and call it a day. It could even circle around critical reviews by launching such a system after embargoes, or just rebrand purchases and options accelerators, or hide them behind subscriptions or premium rewards.

All of these are potential approaches to bring back a monetization mechanic that’s going to cause the same friction, simply because EA is approaching the situation like its free market research on a failed first experiment. That’s precisely why we think we need to keep a close eye on a bunch of parameters in CFB 28, such as its progression speed, XP setting and player control over progression, premium archetypes or bonuses being tied to more expensive additions with obvious gameplay advantages, save-specific purchases, the timing of when they’re announced, and even post-lunch updates.

Some good things to look out for, if EA takes the right ideas to the table, would be meaningful content in expansions, consistently new historical challenges, better presentation packages with additional commentary or broadcast packages, cosmetics, stadium traditions, post-launch modes that needed more time cooking, and of course, balancing and authenticity updates outside of the paid ecosystem.

We’ve made our voices heard once. It’s time to do it again, albeit a tad more proactively this time. We know what we’re asking for, as we always have. We don’t believe in not wanting paid progression in Dynasty, Road to Glory, or in systems that are balanced around optional spending instead of actual progress is an unreasonable demand from entitled players at all. The control we’ve always had over Player XP and progression speed is definitely a must, as is avoiding repetitive purchases across new saves. We’re already paying for a full-priced annual release, after all, and its two most important offline modes need to have systems that do not let you jump ahead too far.

The most important thing to keep in mind is that while EA’s swift response to our protests is indeed commendable, one reversal isn’t a set boundary yet. And if that boundary is to be normalized, organized criticism is always better than a few lone voices pointing to a cold draft that has crept in since the studio left the door ominously open on the return of paid progression in its future titles.

Still, the victory remains ours, and we’re quite confident that the lot of you are going to see this one through over the course of next year. It’s now time to focus on football.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

With three seasons’ worth of additions and the maps released with the base game, Battlefield 6 now has 15 multiplayer maps in total, along with 58 weapons, as well as a host of new vehicles, game modes, and seasonal events, among other things. Battlefield Studios has noted that much of the game’s growth is attributed to direct feedback from the game’s community.

Moving on to Season 4, which will launch on July 21st, Naval Warfare is the headlining feature thanks to the introduction of the Tsuru Reef map, which includes battles across land, sea, and air. A gameplay trailer was released earlier this week, showcasing gameplay on the map.

“Battlefield has always been about player choice. Some battlefields are designed around fast-paced infantry combat, while others provide room to maneuver, make use of vehicles, and approach objectives from different angles. Naval Warfare builds on that philosophy by expanding how players can approach every engagement,” explained Battlefield Studios.

Tsuru Reef is also slated to be one of the biggest maps in Battlefield 6 so far, and has been designed to allow players plenty of options for how they can approach objectives, be it through the use of aerial, land-based, or aquatic vehicles. The map’s design also facilitates new ways for players to flank enemy squads. More details about the map are slated to be revealed as we get closer to its release.

Battlefield Studios has also revealed some statistics about Season 3 of Battlefield 6. The team confirmed that Railway to Golmud became the most-played map in the multiplayer shooter since its arrival, with players spending more than 16 million hours in it. The second most-played map has been Season 2’s Contaminated. The Cairo Bazaar map has seen quite a bit of success, accumulating more than 5.7 million hours of gameplay despite having come only midway through Season 3.

When it comes to game modes, Obliteration has been seen as a success, with more than 413 million hours of accumulated gameplay. Ranked Battle Royale has also been doing quite well with more than 1 billion gameplay hours. Throughout all of these game modes, the M16A4 has been the most popular weapon, being deployed more than twice as many times as any other in-game weapon.

Generally speaking, all of the game modes have been quite close together in terms of popularity, with Conquest, Breakthrough, and Battle Royale all accumulating roughly 200 million gameplay hours throughout Season 3.

As for Season 4, Battlefield Studios has confirmed that the iconic Wake Island map will be making its return in Battlefield 6. More details about the map itself, as well as gameplay changes and community events, will be revealed in the coming days.

Battlefield 6 is available on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S.

One of the biggest changes being made to Dynasty mode is to adjust the speed at which Coach XP is earned. In an upcoming update, the current system will be replaced with three new options: Career, Simulation, and Casual. Career will be the new default setting that is meant to be the intended Dynasty Blueprint experience, with 1.0x XP.

The Simulation option will change the coach progression speed up to 1.25x XP, offering players who want a more realistic pace of gameplay while still making sure that their coach levels up at a faster rate. Casual will be the fastest of the three options, with 1.5x XP, and is described as being equivalent to the Faster setting from College Football 26.

“As we looked at player feedback, our goal was to provide more flexibility in coach progression without compromising the long-term progression that Dynasty Blueprint is designed to deliver,” explained the company.

On the recruitment side of things, Dynasty will be getting several tuning adjustments, like improving the CPU’s tendency to compete for highly rated recruits and its priorities when it comes to training and retaining. The mode will also see balance changes to “better reflect expected recruiting distribution”, which will essentially result in more players being 90 OVR or higher as players get deeper into their Dynasty runs.

Road to Glory, on the other hand, will not be seeing the return of XP sliders. This comes down to the fact that the game mode revolves around difficulty, weekly decisions, Fitness, NIL deals, Wear and Tear, Legacy Score, scholarship bonuses, and on-field performance.

As for why Road to Glory players have reported that they can start at a lower OVR than in the previous game, EA has said that this was an intentional design decision tied to the general scaling of progression throughout the full career. With more options for bonus progression, like annual scholarship bonuses and the ability to play through High School, the company has noted that “Your starting point may look different, but this does not lower what your player can ultimately become.”

The same update is also going to bring in fixes for other issues, like EDGE players in Road to Glory failing to trigger position battles that are otherwise required to advance on the depth chart. A deeper fix for the same issue is planned for next week, which will fully resolve it. Players still facing it following this week’s update are advised to transfer to another school until the next update.

EA Sports College Football 27 is available on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S. Since its release, the title has drawn quite a bit of criticism owing to several factors. Read more about it here. And in the meantime, also take a look at our review, where we gave it a score of 7 out of 10.

The downside is that those with College Points remaining won’t be able to use them in either mode, so use them now while they’re still valid. For the future – including next year’s entry and “beyond” – EA Sports commits to delivering “valuable features and content” with “greater transparency and communication.” Because not letting players know about the paid progression in advance was the real issue.

As for College Football 27, it will provide “follow-up communications” this week about its goals and design details. Available on Xbox Series X/S and PC while marking the series’ debut on PC, the title has received decent critical acclaim and sits at a 75 Metascore based on only six reviews. We gave it a seven out of ten, which you can learn more about here.

However, the fan response is like night and day. The Steam rating is currently “Mostly Negative” with only 36 percent of the 1,064 user reviews recommending it. Whether removing microtransactions from offline play will be enough to reverse this remains to be seen, so stay tuned for updates. But for now, it’s a rough start for what should be one of the biggest sports games of the year.

What we’ve found, largely echoed by other critical analyses of the game and ranging from details like a rather ill-conceived approach to progression, half-baked new additions, and gameplay and presentation issues that crop up too frequently to discount, show many reasons to give this one a pass despite its many improvements. And that’s not even mentioning the recruiting issues that come with Dynasty Mode since EA has told us it’s working on a fix.

But what’s going wrong for a title that looked like it had a lot of potential to be the step forward that the franchise needed? Well, join us and find out as we dive deep into a title that comes with enough gripes to balance out its successes, and whether those problems could ultimately be its downfall.

The Silver Spoon In The Room

It’s probably best to get those concerns about paid progression out of the way early. Yes, different editions of the game come with Dynasty Coach Points and RTG Skill Points, with the amount you get increasing with more expensive variants. Heck, the MVP+ edition even came with all Mascots unlocked, although that’s a whole other thing we’re going to talk about a little later down the line.

Of course, it’s the Coach XP Accelerators available exclusively in Online Dynasty Mode that’s drawing a lot of fire. But is it really as bad considering the enormous 20-30 season requirement to fully get the most out of the Dynasty experience? Those boosts are optional time savers, yes, but their very presence, when considered against a progression loop that demands a lot of time and effort, is enough to make trust around fair progression systems waver a fair bit. The fact that Accelerators can be disabled by commissioners goes lost in all the noise.

"But is it really as bad considering the enormous 20-30 season requirement to fully get the most out of the Dynasty experience?"

Of course, the progression loop we mentioned earlier isn’t helping things one bit. We get what EA was trying to do with, framing the level cap for your Coach as the pinnacle of achievement within the game’s experience. But removing faster ways to get there might not have been a choice that worked well with the good one to keep the level requirements the same while switching up the journey instead. It’s especially worrying since the way it’s all been described looked like it was an intentional part of the game’s design, and one that EA has been very quiet about since the complaints started arising. It’s monitoring feedback, to be sure, but that isn’t any indication of likely fixes being deployed until there’s an official announcement.

Well, that’s a slightly altered progression loop with big ramifications taken care of. It’s now time to take a gander at what’s new with CF27, and why that’s a part of this conversation.

Mascots of Mediocrity

We’re going to nip into our review of the game for this one, since the new Mascot Mashup mode was supposed to be a headlining feature, heralding the return of a popular franchise feature that had been surely missed in the last couple of years.

But with new Mascots being unlocked by just playing a quick game with the respective teams, a lack of enough commentary and tournament options, no alternative formats other than the Quick Play one, and a lack of differentiation between the ones available for unlocking made it quite the disappointment.

It’s especially egregious since EA didn’t shy away from presenting it as one of the highlights of the experience it was offering this time around, and to have it executed so poorly leaves a very bitter taste in the mouth for those who looked forward to it and have since moved on to other modes.

It’s a damn shame though, because there were so many potential ways to make it a worthy addition to the franchise in its latest form. Why aren’t there unique ratings on Mascots, which could work well with unique challenges to claim the ones from higher tiers? Why, oh why, are there no tournaments to be had? Why couldn’t special rule sets be added to this one?

Why is such a beloved part of the franchise returning as a novelty and not a unique feature that could help it chart a course into its future? When you think about MVP+ owners unlocking all Mascots without going through the tedium of hopping into a Play Now game with the corresponding team, you begin to see how CF27’s problems seem minor on their own, but tie into each other in ways that make them feel quite glaring.

"It’s a damn shame though, because there were so many potential ways to make it a worthy addition to the franchise in its latest form."

Its progression systems might have optional paywalls included, but the fact that they don’t include enough variety to make ignoring those paywalls easier just exacerbates both problems in a way that affects perceptions around the value it offers despite them.

Gaming The System

We remember worrying about the logic of the game’s systems being unable to bear the strain they were likely to be put under by players, and it turns out our concerns were founded. It was quite evident in the way we were able to skirt around requirements to progress in Road to Glory in ways that were clearly not intended to be a part of a simulator that aimed to be as realistic as this one. Safeties calling plays? Really?

The problem here is simple. The objectives we were given were so narrowly worded, they almost encouraged finding loopholes around them instead of, you know, actually playing well and being an asset to our team. It felt like we were chasing completion of checklists instead of focusing on enjoying the game and all the good stuff that it brought to the table. It reflects a lack of polish and nuance that could reflect badly on a title that’s definitely among the year’s big releases.

That extends to the presentation, where we found misnomers in the broadcasting, overlapping text layers in the Ultimate Team mode, play art overstaying its welcome on our screens far too often, and the broadcasters often acting like our custom Ultimate Teams were just the home team at wherever we were playing that particular match.

All of that pulls you out of the experience, but wouldn’t be as annoying if EA hadn’t made specific promises about all-new commentary, better presentation and atmosphere, and a more immersive experience overall. It’s annoying because things are definitely great, but these inconsistencies add up to deter truly enjoying everything good that’s on offer.

There are also parts of the presentation that are frankly overdone, too. The Dynasty’s NIL system gives away too much information about an athlete’s chances of signing up with your team based on your offer, and it takes out a layer of unpredictability that would have served the entire thing so darn well.

"There are also parts of the presentation that are frankly overdone, too."

That unpredictability was surely needed in a menu-heavy recruiting loop, and what we’ve got instead is one in which things are too certain for them to be as interesting as they could have been. Sure, it makes getting though seasons a tad easier, which should help those of you looking to max out your Coach, but look at it objectively, and you can’t help but feel like it’s a support pillar designed for an already needlessly elaborate progression loop.

Of course, the slow-moving Ultimate Teams Interface with store access appearing in all of its menus must be mentioned, and deserves to be because it could dissuade even players who swear by it from engaging with it as consistently as it needs to land. As it stands, it’s cumbersome to navigate and isn’t something that’s as fun to engage with as it should be.

There are, of course, other issues that have sprung up during our time with the game, which other reviews have supported. The AI does need a bit of work, and the blockers have been identified as a problem area often enough for them to need some serious work. This is a game that wants you to use your knowledge of football as well as your skills with a controller, and that falls flat when your team doesn’t back up intelligent plays as well as it should.

Pair that with pop-up interactions that kind of plonk the ball right into a waiting defender’s hands, another issue that’s been reported as frequent by critical sources, and you begin to see even the gameplay loop on offer being brought down by niggles that should be minor, but add up enough to bring down the overall perception of quality that matters to a title as big as this one.

The Real Enemy

The real enemy that College Football 27 faces isn’t a lack of new content, but is one that can be a far greater threat. It isn’t a bad football game, not by a long shot. But with Mascot Mashup being the only new addition that’s so poorly executed, and only incremental upgrades to the rest of what’s on offer, it becomes easy to say that stagnation is probably going to hold this one back from achieving its own potential.

Of course, its many problems are ones that can be rapidly addressed, but the game then faces an uphill climb as it aims to shake off its poor reputation at the moment and earn back enough goodwill from its players before the next annual iteration comes along. That’s a narrow window, and a long list of things to address.

But the good news is that EA is listening, and is already addressing a few complaints. Well, let’s just hope that it turns its attention to the game’s other issues, and manages to switch things up in the process.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.

This EA Sports College Football 27 ranking guide is a listing of the top ten quickest players on their feet, for each of the positions of Wide Receiver, Cornerback, Halfback, Free Safety, and Quarterback.

EA Sports College Football 27 Fastest Wide Receivers (WR) Ranked

EA Sports College Football 27 Fastest Cornerbacks (CB) Ranked

EA Sports College Football 27 Fastest Halfbacks (HB) Ranked

EA Sports College Football 27 Fastest Free Safeties (FS) Ranked

EA Sports College Football 27 Fastest Quarterbacks (QB) Ranked

Those are the ten fastest players in the Wide Receiver, Cornerback, Halfback, Free Safety, and Quarterback positions at the launch of EA Sports College Football 27.

This guide is a listing of every single one of the level rewards in the Field Pass’ Season 1 of EA Sports College Football 27.

EA Sports College Football 27 Season 1 Field Pass Rewards List

Those are the rewards for both the free and the premium tracks of the Field Pass in this first season of EA Sports College Football 27.

Change the crowd pattern before any game

For stadiums where classic crowd patterns exist, you can choose to have the crowd wearing whichever patterns you want at whichever games you want. From a Penn State white-out to an LSU Purple Game in Death Valley, you can decide to have as many or as few of the classic crowd pattern games as you’d like, all customizable from the ready screen.

Modular cameras

There’s an additional new setting that allows you to adjust the preferred camera angles on a number of various occurrences within a game, which vary from the classic pre-play shot to how the camera reacts to when your player scores a touchdown. Head into the Visual Feedback section of the Game Settings and select Modular Camera Settings to set your preferences.

More detailed coverage adjustments (hold L2)

There’s a lot more of an ability to control how your secondary lines up and reacts throughout a particular play. By holding L2/LT, you can now choose more detailed coverage adjustments, including allowing you to tell defensive backs which way to shade their receiver and whether to play more conservatively or more aggressively when a play breaks down.

Coach pep talks

On occasion, when a player gets in their head and goes cold, you will now have the option from the substitution menu to have the coach give the player a pep talk. By doing so, you can calm their nerves and remove the ice from their name, putting them back at the top of their game and giving the team an extra boost in the process.

Custom Adjustments

In addition to the detailed on-field adjustments you can make, there’s also an opportunity to create Custom Adjustments, which include an extensive number of options for how you want the team to respond in certain scenarios. These exist for both offense and defense, and can cover everything from which play type defenders guess to pass catching aggressiveness. Make your own in the Create & Share section from the Main Menu.

Assign TE/HB to chip on a route

Within pre-snap pass protection adjustments, you can now ask any receiver to perform a chip block on a particular defender as they run their route. By pressing the hot route button, if your selected receiver has an eligible defender to block, you can press a button to have them chip that defender and release into their route. This risks the blocker losing the battle and falling down on their route, but if they win, it’s another blocker on a pass rusher.

Coach Mode dynasty

Coach Mode is a new presentation style in Dynasty that allows you to limit your input to calling plays on offense and defense, and in turn you watch each snap play out from the sidelines. This is a nice addition for those looking for a lower-touch way to play, and it can be turned on and customized in Dynasty Settings.

Recruits can change their mind in their top 3 after soft committing

When you’re recruiting for your Dynasty program, like in real life, you can’t always be sure that a commit won’t change their mind. Once you get to a recruit’s top 3 schools, they will sometimes soft commit, which indicates the preference for a certain school but allows the others in the top 3 to continue making an effort to sway them back their way.

Don’t renege on NIL commitments in dynasty

NIL money is a huge aspect of Dynasty recruiting now, both in real life and in game, and one way to quickly turn a recruit off from your school is to promise a certain amount of it and then backtrack on that promise later on in the process. The more you can offer a recruit, the likelier they are to be interested in your school, but be sure you can afford to pay it before you promise it.

Dynasty practice control (wear & tear)

Aside from recruiting and weekly games, the other main Dynasty action each week is to set your players’ practice schedules. If you’re worried about the wear and tear on a player’s body, you can set them to a limited amount of practice to reduce the chance of injury, but players who practice in full have a better chance of starting the game hot.

Put in the work in practice (RTG)

Road to Glory returns a number of minigames that help you improve your character by scoring various medals, and this year’s has streamlined the process to make your practice the main way you earn XP and improve trust with your coaches aside from in-game contributions. If you perform well in practice, you’re more likely to get into position battles and play on Saturdays, so you’ll want to maximize your chances each week.

UT archetypes and upgrades

Within Ultimate Team, players are now more directly linked to positional archetypes, each of which has their own upgrade pathway. By using skill points, you can upgrade individual players, but the upgraded traits depend on their specific archetype, such as a Dual-Threat or Pocket Passer quarterback. As you upgrade players that start with similar traits, they will diverge into two notably different styles based on the different attributes upgraded with each level.

Reset your Road to the CFP schedule

It’s not uncommon for a college team to know their season is going to end as a disappointment before the final game ends. While you can’t reset in real life, this year’s Road to the CFP allows you to reset your schedule if you’re unsatisfied with how a certain season is going. It won’t net you anything, but it’ll save you from having to play through multiple meaningless games just to have the chance to start over.

Unlocking mascots in Mascot Mashup

EA CFB 27 comes with 10 mascots unlocked and over 100 left for you to unlock. While the team select screen shows you that any mascot can be unlocked simply by winning a Play Now game with that team, it’s important to note that you have to play the full game. If you Super Sim or quit out, the mascot won’t be unlocked and you’ll have to start a fresh Play Now session.

Trophy Room (see your progress, with some additions)

The Trophy Room returns from previous years but is built out as a better progression monitor this time. Not only are you able to see each of your save files across different modes as well as the rivalry or bowl trophies you’ve accumulated across all modes, but you can now also see all of your unlocked mascots for Mascot Mashup, all with a sprinkle of historical context. Find the Trophy Room in the More section of the Main Menu.