Epic Games announces Easy Anti-Cheat for Linux (including Wine/Proton support)

[Foxlet]

Summary

 

After Valve's promises of anti-cheat support in SteamOS, individual vendors are beginning to publish Linux-compatible versions of their anti-cheat solutions, starting with Epic's Easy Anti-Cheat. The latest version of EAC is supported under native Linux as well as through the Proton and Wine compatibility layers, although the process for enabling it is opt-in for each game developer.

 

Quotes

Quote

Earlier this year, Easy Anti-Cheat for Windows games was made available to all developers, for free. Today, we extend support to Linux and Mac for developers who maintain full native builds of their games for these platforms.

To make it easy for developers to ship their games across PC platforms, support for the Wine and Proton compatibility layers on Linux is included. Starting with the latest SDK release, developers can activate anti-cheat support for Linux via Wine or Proton with just a few clicks in the Epic Online Services Developer Portal.

 

My thoughts

Anti-cheat has historically been one of the major pain points for many gamers trying to switch over to Linux; this essentially removes a blocker that prevented many popular multiplayer games from running on the platform. Given Valve's recent announcement of the Steam Deck being Linux-based, this also opens the path towards 100% game compatibility on their end.

 

Sources

https://www.windowscentral.com/epic-games-makes-easy-anti-cheat-available-linux-paving-way-steam-deck

https://dev.epicgames.com/en-US/news/epic-online-services-launches-anti-cheat-support-for-linux-mac-and-steam-deck (original press release)

[Helpful Tech Witch]

Oh, I can’t call easy anti cheat “easily fuck Linux” any more, that sucks.

 

but hell yeah,  Halo MCC on Linux!!

[RONOTHAN##]

It's almost at the point where I can daily drive Linux. Once Valve gets anti-cheat working on Linux, I'll be able to daily Linux on everything. We're one step closer to that day.

[Pixelfie]

Nice, I can finally give Linux a retry

[AlexGoesHigh]

While this is great and all is a bit annoying that it needs to be enabled by the dev, probably the larger games won't even bother with that.

 

I hope valve can do something and somehow enable EAC games on their own without dev input with the SDK now at hand.

[WereCat]

3 minutes ago, AlexGoesHigh said:

While this is great and all is a bit annoying that it needs to be enabled by the dev, probably the larger games won't even bother with that.

 

I hope valve can do something and somehow enable EAC games on their own without dev input with the SDK now at hand.

I worry that older games with EAC will remain unplayable because devs won't care to enable this compatibility. 

 

It sounds like AMD FSR where apparently the implementation is easy yet we still have only a couple of games that use it. 

[rcmaehl]

Obligatory year of the linux desktop 2022 comment

[Master Disaster]

30 minutes ago, WereCat said:

It sounds like AMD FSR where apparently the implementation is easy yet we still have only a couple of games that use it. 

Interestingly, its possible to use FSR with literally any and all Steam games under Linux, Proton or not. As long as the game is playable under normal circumstances (like ProtonDB Silver or higher) its possible to install Steam Tinker Launch as a compatibility option then have Steam run it before every game you launch then you can enable FSR from STL and play.

 

With it running at full (the interface is very non-informative and I'm not sure what each increment of the slider actually does, it just says 1x, 2x etc) my 5700XT gets a nice boost in MSFS2020 at 1440p (can be up to 20fps but usually closer to 10).

[Fasterthannothing]

I can't wait for my steam deck. I guarantee you Valve is the one driving this to make sure everything is available on their handheld.

[WolframaticAlpha]

10 hours ago, rcmaehl said:

Obligatory year of the linux desktop 2022 comment

As Linus (torvalds) said, there isn't going to be a year of the desktop. It is going to be a slow and iterative process. We are making progress, and I hope that we see a day when Linux is king and Windows is dead.

 

 

All hail Linux!

[Arika]

oh yeah, people still play multiplayer games

[Video Beagle]

Explain anti-cheat to me? I like cheats in games. I do "Chosen People" runs in Wolfenstein with god mode and unlimited ammo and just run around shooting nazis for fun. And I'm doing all kinds of mods in Cyberpunk which exploit cheats and stuff to add lots of depth to the game.

[RejZoR]

13 hours ago, rcmaehl said:

Obligatory year of the linux desktop 2022 comment

The future is now old man! And it's in 2021 already. Manjaro is amazing. Especially since you can rock all the latest and greatest stuff (latest KDE and also latest Kernel 5.14) and not have to touch stupid commandline at any point. I think at least Manjaro team suceeded even if Linux as whole didn't.

[jagdtigger]

13 hours ago, AlexGoesHigh said:

hope valve can do something and somehow enable EAC games on their own without dev input with the SDK now at hand.

They could  collaborate with the devs of EAC to make proton pass the calls directly to the native version running on the machine....

[AlexGoesHigh]

28 minutes ago, Video Beagle said:

Explain anti-cheat to me? I like cheats in games. I do "Chosen People" runs in Wolfenstein with god mode and unlimited ammo and just run around shooting nazis for fun. And I'm doing all kinds of mods in Cyberpunk which exploit cheats and stuff to add lots of depth to the game.

This is for multiplayer games, it's fun to mess around in a game world with cheats like that when it's your own world, not so much in a multiplayer game when you get insta killed by an aimbot due to perfect headshots across the map with a SMG.

 

This is software integrated in the game to catch people that install hacks that let them cheat in the game, this news is that this anti cheat now works on Linux and Mac, it's very important for the steam deck being able to play games that use this

[Helpful Tech Witch]

4 hours ago, Video Beagle said:

Explain anti-cheat to me? I like cheats in games. I do "Chosen People" runs in Wolfenstein with god mode and unlimited ammo and just run around shooting nazis for fun. And I'm doing all kinds of mods in Cyberpunk which exploit cheats and stuff to add lots of depth to the game.

Anti cheat is used for online games, like Valorant (great anti cheat), Fortnite (decent), Csgo (bad), or war zone (might as well not be installed, 

[WolframaticAlpha]

4 hours ago, RejZoR said:

The future is now old man! And it's in 2021 already. Manjaro is amazing. Especially since you can rock all the latest and greatest stuff (latest KDE and also latest Kernel 5.14) and not have to touch stupid commandline at any point. I think at least Manjaro team suceeded even if Linux as whole didn't.

Obligatory comment saying how Linux is the kernel and what you are using is GNU/Linux

Spoiler

’d just like to interject for a moment. What you’re refering to as Linux, is in fact, GNU/LInux, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, GNU plus Linux. Linux is not an operating system unto itself, but rather another free component of a fully functioning GNU system made useful by the GNU corelibs, shell utilities and vital system components comprising a full OS as defined by POSIX.

Many computer users run a modified version of the GNU system every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of GNU which is widely used today is often called “Linux”, and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the GNU system, developed by the GNU Project.

There really is a Linux, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the system they use. Linux is the kernel: the program in the system that allocates the machine’s resources to the other programs that you run. The kernel is an essential part of an operating system, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete operating system. Linux is normally used in combination with the GNU operating system: the whole system is basically GNU with Linux added, or GNU/Linux. All the so-called “Linux” distributions are really distributions of GNU/Linux.

 

this is copypasta

 

[IPD]

Can we get them to release a "Make Something Unreal - 2021 Edition" contest?

 

...of course not.  Epic has 0 F's to give about UT, gaming innovation, or literally anything other than Fortnite printing money.

[cj09beira]

wait will i be able to play rust again?? (not sure it would do me any good to actually do it though)

[RejZoR]

1 hour ago, WolframaticAlpha said:

Obligatory comment saying how Linux is the kernel and what you are using is GNU/Linux

  Reveal hidden contents

’d just like to interject for a moment. What you’re refering to as Linux, is in fact, GNU/LInux, or as I’ve recently taken to calling it, GNU plus Linux. Linux is not an operating system unto itself, but rather another free component of a fully functioning GNU system made useful by the GNU corelibs, shell utilities and vital system components comprising a full OS as defined by POSIX.

Many computer users run a modified version of the GNU system every day, without realizing it. Through a peculiar turn of events, the version of GNU which is widely used today is often called “Linux”, and many of its users are not aware that it is basically the GNU system, developed by the GNU Project.

There really is a Linux, and these people are using it, but it is just a part of the system they use. Linux is the kernel: the program in the system that allocates the machine’s resources to the other programs that you run. The kernel is an essential part of an operating system, but useless by itself; it can only function in the context of a complete operating system. Linux is normally used in combination with the GNU operating system: the whole system is basically GNU with Linux added, or GNU/Linux. All the so-called “Linux” distributions are really distributions of GNU/Linux.

 

this is copypasta

 

Given how Ubuntu is always using decades old Kernel, yeah it damn sure matters. But I guess I'd be more hip using I don't know, Solaris?

[BuckGup]

8 hours ago, Arika S said:

oh yeah, people still play multiplayer games

I haven't player a singleplayer game since 2007 and it was Zoo Tycoon lmao

[wanderingfool2]

8 hours ago, WolframaticAlpha said:

As Linus (torvalds) said, there isn't going to be a year of the desktop. It is going to be a slow and iterative process. We are making progress, and I hope that we see a day when Linux is king and Windows is dead.

 

 

All hail Linux!

Linux will only get my support [for everyday recommendation use to people] when it doesn't require any terminal access and hardware drivers are all supported.  The story I give is that I plugged in a 1080p TV and everything was displayed so small/broken.  It took multiple terminal commands/updating/trying different drivers to get it to an usable state.

 

Windows does have it's faults, but overall you have to hand it to Microsoft in general it just works as users expect out of the box.

[Lightwreather]

5 hours ago, RejZoR said:

 Manjaro

Ah,

Be careful not to announce that to the Linux community....

Some people are gonna run you down for that

[Forbidden Wafer]

19 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

Given how Ubuntu is always using decades old Kernel, yeah it damn sure matters. But I guess I'd be more hip using I don't know, Solaris?

TIL that Solaris not only is not dead, but the latest update was released 10 days ago.

[Kisai]

19 hours ago, AlexGoesHigh said:

While this is great and all is a bit annoying that it needs to be enabled by the dev, probably the larger games won't even bother with that.

 

I hope valve can do something and somehow enable EAC games on their own without dev input with the SDK now at hand.

I don't expect any game to enable Linux support for EAC except those that are primarily p2p (think mario party-like instead of MMORPG-like)

 

Games that are highly competitive and have GAAS(Games as a Service) would not enable Linux support (Eg Valorant, Apex, Overwatch, PUBG, Fortnite) because the platforms are inherently insecure to begin with, and Linux users wouldn't pay for microtransactions anyways.

 

But that's just my speculation. If you owned a highly successful competitive e-sport and it's functionality is dependent upon everyone playing unmodified games, the thing I'd do is make the game stream the rendered video and audio back to the developer's server, and when someone is suspected of cheating, compare the "cheating" player's stream to the players they were playing with. It doesn't need to be a 1920x1080x60fps stream, but the vast majority of cheats involve "wall-hacking" or "GUI quality of life" lies, or parsing the the games network data to gain advantages to have a timing advantage.