Apex Legends is one of the only battle royale games that lets you play on a Steam Deck gaming handheld — Fortnite, Valorant, PUBG and more never supported it in the first place, citing concerns about anti-cheat. But today, Electronic Arts and Respawn are taking the game away for that very same reason.

This isn't that unusual, as there are plenty of big shooters that have never supported the Steam Deck, including Fortnite, but as noted by GamesRadar, Apex Legends was quite a popular title on the handheld, sitting within the top 50 most played games in the past year.

EA has announced that it's pulling Linux support for Apex Legends, meaning that the game is no longer officially supported on Steam Deck. The devs say it's down to just how hard it is to catch cheaters on the operating system.

This, coupled with the relatively small number of players reliant on Linux, is likely what informed EA's decision to end Steam Deck support. Apex Legends sees a ton of daily users, and dropping the Linux ones likely won't be a death knell.

Electronic Arts has blocked Steam Deck players from its cooperative shooter, Apex Legends.

EA have confirmed that they have no plans for an Apex Legends 2-style game as Respawn is going through a “systematic rethink” of the battle royale. Over the past year or so, Apex Legends has seen plenty of players walk away.

"There is currently no reliable way for us to differentiate a legitimate Steam Deck from a malicious cheat claiming to be a Steam Deck."