AFL 26

A real step up for a starved niche audience

AFL 26, released 7 May 2025 by Big Ant Studios and published by Nacon, is the newest yearly entry in one of the only Australian rules football simulations currently on the market, offering career, team management, and online play for a fanbase with essentially nowhere else to turn. That scarcity shapes much of the review sample's tone from the outset. One reviewer, comparing it directly to its predecessor, calls it "100% step up from AFL 23" while noting "everything about it feels a bit too familiar, especially aesthetically," a mixed but genuinely improved starting point. Another reviewer is considerably more emphatic, stating "this is nowhere near as bad as the shambles that AFL 23 was," and describing the current game as "a very well-functioning game" that they find "quite good for what it is," despite acknowledging "some missing features" and occasional bugs.

Specific gameplay refinements draw real praise across the sample. One reviewer highlights the variety in ball-kicking mechanics, citing the "ability to easily snap, dribble, kick off the ground etc" as a meaningful improvement, while also praising graphics that were "actually better than I was expecting" and an enjoyable management mode. Presentation details land well too, with reviewers calling out accurate stadium recreations, custom banners, and expanded kit customisation as evidence of real effort from what multiple reviewers describe as "a small development team" working with a fraction of the budget of major sports franchises. Several reviewers explicitly push back against comparisons to titles like FIFA or NBA 2K, arguing, as one puts it, that such comparisons are "unfair for the market AFL has" given the sport's far smaller global audience and correspondingly smaller development budget.

A launch defined by crashes and instability

Set against that improvement, the review sample's most heavily corroborated and serious criticism concerns the game's stability at launch. One reviewer, writing what amounts to a formal refund request after four hours of play, reports the game "has crashed multiple times and suffers from numerous bugs that significantly impact the gameplay experience," describing it as feeling "incomplete and unpolished, resembling a beta rather than a finished retail product." That is far from an isolated report: other reviewers independently describe crashes specifically tied to entering "pro team" menus, the "Player Number Selector following the mid season draft," the "Guernsey assignment menu in Team Management mode," and, in one case, a crash that occurred "during the song at the end of the game" after a completed match.

Several reviewers frame the sheer density of bugs as disqualifying given the asking price, with one writing bluntly the game is "not good enough for a fresh release charging $100," after experiencing crashes across multiple modes over dozens of hours. Another reviewer goes further, describing the launch as "almost less playable than an Early Access game" due to the volume of issues encountered, including an unusual penalty dispute caused by a bug during a match. To their credit, multiple reviewers separately confirm Big Ant has followed up with a steady cadence of post-launch patches, with one noting "there have been several updates rectifying issues, which is good to see," suggesting the stability picture may be actively improving since launch even if it wasn't acceptable on day one.

A price tag the current state doesn't fully justify

Beyond bugs specifically, a second, widely corroborated complaint concerns the game's NZ$85.99 price relative to what reviewers feel it currently delivers. One reviewer states plainly "the price is not indicative of quality," arguing "this is a $50 AUD game tops, and I mean tops," while acknowledging the series has "never had the same budget as your 2K / FIFAs" and remains "a niche game for a niche sport." Another reviewer frames the same complaint in terms of year-over-year value specifically, writing "if you've played AFL 23 then you've played AFL 26, and the small improvements while welcome are just not enough to warrant a $100 price tag for a new game," pointing to persistent issues like "stiffness" and "the game being diluted to rhythmic button pressing" that carried over largely unaddressed.

A related complaint concerns core gameplay feel for reviewers less forgiving of the series' constraints, with one describing matches as "extremely clunky" and lacking meaningful player agency, and another reporting a specific, repeatedly encountered AI bug where "the opposition just decides to not kick and do nothing," triggering a "holding the ball" loop that effectively halts play until it resolves itself. Commentary also draws criticism, with one reviewer describing commentators who "sound like they are trying to record lines rather than commentating," suggesting presentation polish has not kept pace with the underlying mechanical improvements the series has made.

Verdict

AFL 26 is, by its own review sample's account, a real and credited step forward for a series that desperately needed one, offering improved kicking mechanics, stadium presentation, and management-mode depth for a fanbase with few genuine alternatives. But the density of crash reports at launch, spanning career mode, team management menus, and even post-match celebrations, combined with a steep NZ$85.99 price that a large share of reviewers argue the current build doesn't justify, mean this remains a game best approached with patience. Committed AFL fans willing to wait out patches and tolerate real instability will likely find more to enjoy here than in the franchise's rockier past entries; everyone else should wait for a sale and a few more rounds of bug fixes.