Another day, another update from the Apex Legends security team about the fight against hackers. It’s a never-ending struggle for the battle royale, and the latest change from developer Respawn Entertainment is decidedly bad news for Linux users.
In an attempt to help further stamp out the game’s cheating problem, Respawn is making Apex unavailable to play on Linux operating systems completely. This comes with the knock-on effect of also making it much harder to play the game on Steam Deck, since the device uses Linux to run by default. Steam Deck users can download Windows for the device, which would make it still possible—but playing a game as intensive as Apex on Steam Deck was already a chore, and anyone using the device likely won’t bother. In a short post on the subject, the security team said Linux OS was “identified as being a path for a variety of impactful exploits and cheats.” The team decided the best way to deal with these cheats was to remove access to the game for Linux users altogether.