The latest instalment of the rugby league video game series has been a major disappointment for many NRL fans.

Since its launch, the game has undergone several patches and updates to try and rectify gameplay issues.

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Big Ant Studios, the developer responsible for Rugby League 26, have produced video games for the NRL since 2010.

However, on a recent episode of The Journos podcast, Sydney Morning Herald reporter Michael Chammas revealed that the league was in talks with industry giant, EA Sports, during the development of the game.

“I think the NRL made enquiries with EA Sports,” he said.

“Big Ant has run the game over a number of years.

“Apparently it was going to cost them $50-60 million, that’s the quote they got given by EA Sports.

“That was never going to happen.”

One of the reasons that EA Sports wouldn’t pick up the rights to the game for anything under that number, is the lack of demand for a video game based on an Australian sporting organisation.

“The great challenge of course is the economics of building these games are also going up exponentially,” EA Sports CEO Andrew Wilson said at the SportNXT conference, hosted in Melbourne in March.

“Many of our games are hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars in development, and many millions of dollars in marketing.

“So you’ve got to sell many millions of copies and it’s hard to underwrite that for a sport that has its basis in Australia.”

Rugby League 26 customers have taken to social media over the last week, venting their frustrations about the state of the product.

If someone is charging $100 for a video game in 2025 they need to deliver a quality product.

Rugby League 26 has not met the markets expectation for a $100 game.

Its not a friend. Its not a pal. Its a company that took your $100 knowing what it was selling you.

No excuses…

— League Freak (@LeagueFreak) July 19, 2025

8 years of waiting for Rugby League 26 and we get a lazy reskin of Live 4 with worse frame rate, stripped career mode, no player stats, no NSW Cup, and forced online play? This is an embarrassment. The NRL needs to give the license to someone else. #RugbyLeague26 #NRL

— user (@AustraliaSniper) July 17, 2025

“Sometimes you pay for what you get,” said Chammas.

Several players have also reportedly raised concerns to the RLPA about likeness and the intellectual property of using their characters in the game.

“There has been an issue raised to the NRL from the RLPA around players complaining about how they look, especially female players who are offended by the way they’ve been portrayed,” said Chammas.

“I think they’ve asked the NRL to look into Big Ant to try and get those players re-scanned and added to the game.”

Rugby League 26 was eight-years in the making and with the fan backlash that has ensued in recent days, the NRL may be in the market for a new developer for the next instalment of the series.