The best-selling sports game of the year didn’t get mentioned

The sports category at the Game Awards is probably one of the least attention-grabbing groups, but this year it’s most noteworthy for a glaring absence: EA Sports College Football 25. The series’ return after a decade of dormancy put it at the top of the sales charts before it was even fully out, with its $100 deluxe edition even charting separately alongside the base game.

Sales don’t equate to critical acclaim, but in a category full of perennial sequels derided for their lack of innovation and stifling microtransaction economies, it’s interesting that College Football didn’t place at all. It has a higher Metacritic rating than every other game in the category, including WWE 2K24 and F1 24, even if it has far fewer overall reviews than those games. In the end, there’s probably just much less overall interest in a simulation of an American college sport among the Game Awards’ global jury pool. — Ethan Gach