Warner Bros. Interactive confirms that Batman: Arkham Knight has been cancelled for both Mac and Linux, with the publisher offering Steam refunds to pre-order customers.

Although the console releases of Batman: Arkham Knight proved to be incredibly successful, home computer ports of the title have fared much worse in the market. Now, the situation has become even worse for the final part of the Arkham series. Publisher Warner Bros. Interactive has revealed that both the Mac and Linux versions of the game have been officially cancelled.

The news was confirmed by Warner Bros. through an incredibly brief post on the game's Steam community page. "We are very sorry to confirm that Batman: Arkham Knight will no longer be coming to Mac and Linux," explained the post. The publisher did not give a reason for the cancellation, instead giving a set of instructions to those who had pre-ordered the title for Mac or Linux, requesting that those users "please apply for a refund via Steam."

The reveal of this situation will no doubt be unhappy news for Mac and Linux players who were hoping to finally have a chance to play the game on their preferred platform. However, it may well have been a bullet dodged all things considered. When the game originally saw release on PC, it was hit with a multitude of problems, and even after multiple fixes, the title still suffered from a number of problems that seemingly could not be overcome.

Part of the problem with the PC version of Batman: Arkham Knight was that the title was being developed away from the eyes of main series developer Rocksteady Studios. Instead, the PC port was outsourced to Iron Galaxy Studios. It seems as though the same strategy was used for the Mac and Linux versions of the game, with these two ports being created by Feral Interactive.

The end result is yet another refund being offered, and fans of the franchise have an unfortunate familiarity with the process. The title first saw refunds to customers when the title's PC issues became overwhelmingly apparent, proving to be a stern test for the newly-launched Steam refunds process. When it became obvious that the issues were not going away, even after extensive work, Warner Bros. once more offered up a complete refund.

The struggles that the Mac and PC ports of the game have faced should perhaps have acted as an indicator that Warner Bros. might need a rethink of its development strategy. However, it appears as though both the publisher and developer Rocksteady are already ploughing ahead with future projects, with Rocksteady hinting that further Batman content is coming in 2016. With Warner Bros. also discussing its "endless possibilities" for the Caped Crusader, fans of Batman will no doubt be worried that there will be more issues with games to come.

Source: Steam