Sadly, I missed the Madden era.

No, not that of the actual John Madden, the Hall of Fame football coach and broadcaster. I grew up watching plenty of games with him on the Raiders sideline.

His retirement coincided with my transition from high school to college. I loved his inimitable color commentary from the start. I’d call it revolutionary, but that would imply he could be duplicated. I was never a Raiders fan, but I’ve always been a John Madden fan.

When younger football fans refer to Madden, it’s usually about the video game, “Madden NFL,” which started as “John Madden Football” in 1994. This was a year after the release of “Bill Walsh College Football,” which eventually evolved into EA Sports College Football.

I missed out on college football’s most popular modern video game, too. It’s a generational thing. My youthful days, when I had the time and inclination for video games, go all the way back to Pong. Then, in college, I spent way too much time and too many quarters on Pac-Man. In the late 1980s I could not get enough Tecmo Bowl — crude by today’s standards, but loads of fun, and you didn’t need the reflexes of a fighter pilot to win. You just needed Bo Jackson. If you remember, not even Lawrence Taylor could stop Bo.

So, there is definitely a part of me that relates to the buzz of the big news in gaming this week: “EA Sports College Football 25” has arrived.

“It may well be the most anticipated sports video game ever in the U.S.,” according to a Tuesday article in The Guardian.

The reason for the excitement is an 11-year gap since the last previous edition, NCAA Football 14 — which, as usual for the franchise, sold more than a million copies.

Why the hiatus? It ties in with the early stages of the name, image and likeness revolution of college sports. In the previous editions of NCAA Football, players in the simulation performed with similar skill as the real-life guys playing their position — they were identified by their uniform number, but not by name. It was pretty obvious who was who.

EA Sports paid the NCAA for licensing, but in the antiquated and obsolete notion of amateurism, the players themselves were not compensated. This, and EA’s college basketball game, were among the most blatant examples of the system’s unfairness. These games were a big part of the evidence when athletes like UCLA basketball star Ed O’Bannon filed successful lawsuits that led to financial settlements.

Meanwhile, the NFL players have always gotten their piece of the pie from EA for use of their likenesses, via the NFL Players Association — although, at least in the early years, some stars might have mixed feelings about being featured on the game’s cover, since that player always seemed to suffer some kind of misfortune the next season.

The college players don’t have a union, at least not yet. But, 10,000 college players accepted EA’s offer of $600 and a copy of the game for the rights to include their image in College Football 25, according to multiple reports.

The game’s standard version will be available Friday. But some gamers who preordered a deluxe version, or bought it with Madden 25, have been devouring it since Monday.

Their reviews are generally positive. Many say College Football 25 is not just a “re-skinned” version of Madden, and EA used its time well to create a game that reflects college football’s uniqueness, incorporating technological advances of the past decade.

Like the old EA Sports motto says, “It’s in the game.”

And now, if you’re in the game you got paid.