Kernel access isn't needed if they use signed boot and can verify everything running is what it should be.

Yes!! They could just do holistic anti-cheat data analysis instead.

Blame the cheaters.

While I agree that it’s morally correct let’s also not be under any delusions that a company as garbage as EA isn’t using ai to screen applications. That makes your applying not only a waste of your time but also resources that are being sucked up by ai

What's a good alternative to their sports games, like EA FC 25 which I've been playing a lot recently?

Yes. I'm super pleased that EA appears to be doing the right thing, here.

Absent everything thing else EA does and stands for, I would applaud this move by buying something from them sometime.

That said, I will continue to abstain from EA games for another few decades. I like the "sense of pride and accomplishment" it gives me.

Probably. But also just wider Linux adoption. Over 8% of English-speaking Steam users are on Linux now. That number is already at a point where it makes sense to cater to them. Who doesn't want 8% more sales? Numbers much smaller than that drive quarterly decisions.

(The large disparity between English speaking and not is the Chinese market. Linux has near 0% adoption there. The dip in the last month, for example, corresponds to a single-month doubling of the number of Chinese users in the Steam stats; which also suggests major measurement errors coming out of China.)

Absolutely. Valve took Linux seriously and it's helped Linux gaming immensely. But you can argue a few things - Valve are private and can still do what they want without an obligation to shareholders. Linux gives them better control of the software on their own devices, so they can tailor the experience exactly how they want. Investing in proton made it so people are willing to buy and use these devices, as the game library becomes nearly identical to windows.

A company like EA, a monolith at this point and historically one of the most profit driven, greedy, arguably scummy companies in gaming, if they're investing in Linux support that means they see dollars and other companies will follow suit. They're specifically looking at their anti cheat software according to this picture which would bring in their competitive shooters, the type of game that is largely missing on Linux.

If their anti cheat supports Linux, others like Easy anti cheat may push to support Linux, and developers like facepunch have even less of a leg to stand on when it comes to ignoring Linux. Unless EA does something like "You must be using our new EA Linux distro for our anti cheat to work" I can't see this being a bad thing.

I don't think that people are demonizing them for attempting to migrate to Linux.

I'm pretty sure (because of my own reaction to this news, as well as the other comments) that it's to do with people's dislike of kernel-level anti-cheat and EA's attempt to bring that to Linux.

They aren't being demonized for 'taking Linux seriously.' They are being demonized for the horns, forked tongue, spade-tipped tail, ichorous blood, and subservience to satan that are everything they have done before now. When the guy who moved in at No.1 and raped their daughter, then moved in at No.3 and raped their daughter, and then did it again at No.5 is showing up at your house at No.7, it might be called 'great news' that someone is finally interested in finally renting out that room you've had available for the last several years, but if you let them in, they're just going to rape your daughter. It's what they do.

Exactly! This is exactly what we want, more big players on linux.

Of course the kernel level anti-cheat is another thing that needs to be addressed, but a big company acknowledgig the importance of linux is a huge victory to me.

I'm willing to celebrate.. if it's a net positive in the end. Linux gamers being able to play big titles, or game with Windows-using friends is good. Having to run DRM/adware/rootkit "anti-cheat", subscriptions and dark patterns is very bad.

My outlook on the modern games industry is very low overall and I don't see how to fix it. If I could do anything I'd instead promote and invest into "open source" games (software freedom respecting games).

Absolutely!
And the focus on ARM caught me off-guard too, I wonder if they're looking out for future handhelds being ARM or what.

The problem is, this may actually NOT about anti-cheat. Just like, age verification is justified by "child protection", anti-cheat may be a gateway to gradually take away the control over the kernel.

As some other people said, if they want effective anti-cheat, why not make it server-side? Maybe I worry too much, but the history tells us these companies likely not act in good faith.

If the game state of every player at any time can be simulated entirely on server then yes, to some degree. This isn't the case for many games that have some degree of client authoritativeness, like Apex Legends. As the other poster mentioned, this doesn't eliminate seeing through walls still, or other cheats that expose game state that players can't normally see but are required for the game to work.

If all games were streamed over the network, like in GeForce Now, then we would perhaps require far less client anticheat.

i'm a proponent of server-side anticheat, but there is a few reasons games do it client side.

• server-side anticheats depend on heuristics and "checks" determining if a player is doing something "impossible".
• one example would be checking if the player somehow has perfect accuracy on every player before even shooting, or if the player moves further than is possible in a given timespan (these are very simple examples).
• this is MUCH more difficult to make accurate, since these checks are fallible to network conditions or other hiccups.
• most online games opt for client-side anticheat since it lets the devs just "trust the client" easier. it can also detect things that would be impossible server-side, like X-ray (seeing other players through walls. this is impossible to detect server side).

Yes and I am a game designer.

They want to control your data and device fully

I don't understand this bird or animal that are cheats or kernel level anti cheat. But my guess why it's not handled server side is it's too late to detect anything. At that point all the cheats will be well disguised as user input.

When the anti-cheat runs on the client workstation, it just tries to make sure the client isn't doing something nefarious. It's cost effective for the game company and doesn't cost the end user much except compatibility

To do it on the server, you end up needing to run a full simulation of the game which is really expensive at scale. You can, to some extent, just look for input values and thresholds, but over the years of trying to do this, people always find ways to cheat input threshold monitoring.

An interesting take is making the end user run the client on a rented server, then they can both have the client remote and not pay for anticheat at all.

I don't believe there is a viable path for kernel-level anti-cheat on Linux (thank god). What most developers have done is enable normal anti-cheats on Linux, even if they use kernel-level ones on Windows. This is the path they seem to be going down.

Ever since CrowdStrike, I'm a bit amazed Microsoft hasn't taken a hard stance on the gaping security hole that is kernel-level anti-cheat. It's bonkers such is expected or even allowed just to play a game.

I'm looking forward to it. Not because I will buy more EA games, but because it will remove one of the few barriers left for even wider Linux adoption.

I have EA added to ignore list, and i want block list to completely remove it

I take it you also want users to stay on Windows.