American college sport remains a great mystery to many people in this odd little nation at the bottom of the world.
Stadiums that seat 100,000 fans? Million-dollar shoe deals and broadcasting rights? Wall-to-wall media coverage?
It sure is a world away from university sport in New Zealand, which has its own charms but cannot remotely compare to the world of big-time US college sports.
And it does not get more big-time than college football.
I think I am right in saying that of the dozen biggest sports stadiums in the world, eight of them belong to American universities.
Like the "Big House", where the University of Michigan men regularly play in front of 110,000 fans. Nuts.
Long story short, college football is an insanely big business in Trump country.
Yet there has been no college football video game for 11 long years. What gives?
It comes down to money.
Former college football players sued game developers EA, arguing successfully that their likenesses were being used in video games without compensation being paid.
And at the same time, the NCAA — rulers of college sport — stuck steadfastly to the rule that college athletes were "students first" (hah) and not allowed to be paid.
That bizarre, basically-legalised-slavery situation has now been addressed, and college athletes can be recompensed — for some seriously good money — for their NIL (name, image and likeness) rights.
Which brings me back to this review and the fact we can finally play college football on our consoles again. And it was worth the wait.
College Football 25 is just a supremely smooth and deep representation of the sport.
It builds on the yearly work EA does on the Madden series, obviously, but takes it further with gameplay tweaks and an immense amount of content.
College football means pageantry, and it is impossible to imagine more being crammed into a game.
Think marching bands, mascots, "fight songs", cheerleaders and all the buzz and intensity of game day.
There are 130-plus colleges represented with accurate stadiums, uniforms, crowd chants and playbooks. And nearly 12,000 real-life players.
On the field, CF25 embraces the spirit of the college game and is just a bit quicker and, for want of a better word, looser than recent Madden games.
You can run and gun and try a few crazy things, and honestly it is a more fun gaming experience than big brother.
A new wear-and-tear system forces you to consider the welfare of your young players and make decisions accordingly.
There is an Ultimate Team mode — the highlight of which is unlocking college football legends to join your team — and a "Road to Glory" campaign in which you create a player and try to make him a legend.
But CF25 is all about Dynasty mode — choose your school and lead it to glory.
College sport means recruiting is everything, and that side of the game is so deep it is frightening.
When you are given a spreadsheet that shows you position needs, and you get to allocate time to selling your school’s appeal to high school students, you know a game is digging deep.
Best sports game I have played in years.
Go Longhorns.
