I tried it again after a long absense to the series, it really should be free to play and should have probably been for years.
They make their money off skins, and one game mode has been free to play for years already.
The campaign is basically non-existent, so you're paying $70 for just the multiplayer, and it gets neglected by devs in favor of the free mode, because that's where they make the most money.
Same with Madden.
The franchise mode on Madden 64 has pretty much all the features of Madden 24. Hell, it had helmet cam back then, that might actually be cool to play Madden in first person these days.