Epic Games is addressing one of Windows-on-Arm’s last big app compatibility gaps

Drivers and kernel-level software can't be translated automatically by Windows.

Using a Windows PC with an Arm-based Snapdragon processor in it feels a lot like using a regular-old Intel or AMD PC these days, thanks to the work developers have put in to get their apps running natively on Arm chips and the work Microsoft has done on Windows' Prism technology for translating x86 apps to run on Arm processors. But some of the old compatibility gaps remain.

For example, while many PC games will run well enough on an Arm PC without any changes from the game's developer, online multiplayer games that rely on kernel-level anti-cheat software generally don't work. Drivers and other lower-level Windows software can't be translated by Prism, and in many cases, the Arm PC user base is still small enough that developers haven't put in the work to get Arm versions of their software up and running.

Epic Games is taking a step in that direction later this year—today, the company announced that it's bringing its Epic Online Services Easy Anti-Cheat software to Arm PCs, along with official Windows-on-Arm support for Fortnite. Both are coming to Arm PCs "later this year."

"In addition to releasing Windows on Snapdragon anti-cheat support for Fortnite, we will bring this support to developers through an Epic Online Services SDK release," the company's blog post says. "This will enable developers using Easy Anti-Cheat to bring this compatibility to their own games."

It sounds like game developers who use Epic's anti-cheat software will still need to update their games to make them Arm-compatible, but Epic adding support to its SDK should at least make implementation relatively simple.

Microsoft's development tools support running a mix of translated x86 code and native Arm code (called "Arm64EC," this feature was added in Windows 11). We've asked both Epic and Microsoft if a game written for x86 processors could run alongside the Arm-native anti-cheat software or if the game would also need to be ported to Arm—obviously, having to create an Arm-native port would increase the level of effort needed from developers. We'll update the article if we receive a definitive response.

Epic's anti-cheat software isn't the only kernel-level anti-cheat software that exists, and it will still probably be a while before all of the different implementations work on Arm PCs. But if Epic thinks it's in the company's interest to bring this software to Windows on Arm, it's an indication that these PCs are doing well enough for an Arm port to be worth the time and effort.

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