Fortnite on Linux: Epic Rebuilds Easy Anti-Cheat and Opens the Door to Steam Deck

Epic Games has confirmed that Fortnite will run on Linux, and it will do so alongside the new Epic Games Store launcher. As reported by Vandal, the company slipped the news into its controversial mid-October statement presenting a launcher built with generative artificial intelligence. What matters is not so much the launcher announcement as the fine print: to get the battle royale running on Linux, Epic is rebuilding Easy Anti-Cheat so that it is compatible with different distributions, including SteamOS.

Why does this matter to anyone playing on a Steam Deck or a Steam Machine? Because the big wall separating those devices from many online multiplayer games is not raw power, but anti-cheat. Several of the most-played competitive titles simply will not launch on Linux for that reason. If Epic manages to get EAC working alongside Valve's system, the benefit will not stop at Fortnite: any studio using that technology could enable compatibility and join a catalogue that, according to the figures cited by Vandal, already exceeds 30,000 games playable on Steam Deck.

What you need to know

• Fortnite is coming to Linux alongside the new Epic Games Store launcher, according to the company statement reported by Vandal.
• Epic is rebuilding Easy Anti-Cheat so that it works on several Linux distributions, including SteamOS.
• Other games will be able to take advantage of that revamped version of EAC, which would open the door to Steam Deck, Steam Machine and Linux PCs.
• The announcement came in mid-October within a contested statement, because the launcher was programmed with generative artificial intelligence.
• There is no specific date in the published information: the source talks about work in progress, not a locked-in release.

The real obstacle: anti-cheat

Steam Deck has spent years proving that Linux is a legitimate gaming platform. With Proton, Valve has made a huge number of titles run without the user touching a thing. The problem appears in a very specific but very popular niche: online multiplayer games with anti-cheat systems that integrate deeply with the operating system. Many developers never enabled Linux support, whether through lack of resources, distrust or plain indifference.

Easy Anti-Cheat is one of the most widely used systems in the industry and belongs to Epic Games itself. The fact that the company is rebuilding it with Linux in mind is significant because it removes one of the usual excuses. Until now, each studio had to decide whether to take the leap on its own. With a version of EAC designed from the ground up for distributions like SteamOS, the effort required to enable a game should be far smaller.

Who comes out ahead

The first to benefit are those who own a Steam Deck or plan to buy a Steam Machine. But the advantage extends to anyone gaming on desktop Linux, a small but very active audience. Valve also wins, having long tried to make its ecosystem a real alternative to Windows. And Epic wins, since Fortnite is its biggest showcase and it cannot afford to be missing from a device with so much pull among players.

Our take

Here at the Underworld Lordz editorial desk, we will say it plainly: this is the best news Epic has delivered in a long time, even if it arrived wrapped in a statement that generated more noise for its artificial intelligence than for its content. For the competitive community, being able to practise or grind from a Steam Deck without weird configurations changes the daily routine. For content creators, it opens up a new format: handheld matches, streaming from anywhere and performance comparisons that are impossible today because the game does not even launch.

That said, it is best not to get ahead of ourselves. The source mentions no date, and rebuilding an anti-cheat is delicate work. An EAC poorly adapted to Linux could become a sieve for cheats, and in a competitive game that is unacceptable. We would rather wait a few more months than have an exploitable version. Moreover, the fact that compatibility exists does not mean every studio will enable it: many games could run on Steam Deck today, and their developers still have not taken the step.

There is one last detail that worries us. Epic has tied Fortnite's arrival on Linux to its own launcher, not to Steam. That means that, on paper, playing on Steam Deck would involve installing a third-party launcher on a device designed around Steam. We will see how smooth that experience is in Gaming Mode, because convenience is precisely what makes Valve's handheld special.

What do you think?

We have spent years asking for the big multiplayer games to run on Steam Deck, and it finally looks like something is moving. Would you jump into Fortnite on a Linux handheld, or would you rather stick with PC and console? Let us know in the team chat or on our Discord.