A shakeup is coming to college video game licensing. Here's what that means for everybody

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Most Extra Points readers are broadly familiar with the terms of the licensing agreements for EA Sports College Football 25. EA set aside 10% of sales revenue to go to a licensing pool for the college IP, with schools who finished with lots of AP Top 25 finishes over the last decade getting more money. Players, on the other hand, were offered $600 and a free copy of the game.

While some lawyers and athlete-advocates strongly criticized the terms of the deal, athletes quickly signed on to the proposal in record numbers, signaling that they really, really wanted to be in this video game.

In turns out, lots of fans also wanted to buy that video game. While exact revenues are difficult to calculate, back-of-napkin reports show that at a minimum, CFB25 was one of the best-selling sports video games ever. Licensing revenue breakdowns obtained by Extra Points via Open Records requests also showed multiple schools earning well above and beyond their initial licensing projections (i.e, schools that projected five-figure licensing fees were instead paid north of $200,000).

But the initial licensing agreement with the athletes did not include any royalty payments. Whether the game sold one copy or eleven gazillion copies, the payment to the athletes, according to the terms of the contract, remained the same. $600.

But now another company, Pathway Sports and Entertainment, is looking to change that dynamic. And that could bring meaningful changes not just to athletes, but for schools, consumers…even the video game industry as a whole.

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