For years, Unity and Unreal have ruled the game‑development landscape, accounting for roughly 70% of Steam releases projected for 2025. While Godot has made notable strides and some studios cling to proprietary solutions—Capcom’s RE Engine, for instance—the duopoly of Unity and Unreal still dominates the market. Enter Immens, a startup founded by three seasoned industry veterans: Arjan Brussee, Sjoerd De Jong, and Michal Valient. Their résumés span heavyweight names such as Epic Games (the creator of Unreal), Guerrilla Games, Boss Key, and Apple.
The trio believes there is still room for a fresh engine and, more importantly, for a better way to build games. In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, Brussee argues that the timing is ripe for a new platform that simply didn’t exist a few years ago.
"With AI‑assisted programming, we can start building from the ground up again," he says. "Guided by intelligent tools, developers can achieve full‑featured results far more quickly." Valient, Immens’ chief technology officer, clarifies that their use of AI isn’t about conjuring assets with a single prompt.
Instead, the AI is woven into the engine’s architecture to make it highly extensible. "AI can reason over massive codebases and data sets. If we design the engine with that capability in mind, even solo developers or tiny teams can extend it beyond simple scripting. Want a custom particle system?
You can plug it in directly. That’s the kind of flexibility we’re building." The motivation behind this AI‑powered engine is the increasingly hostile economics of game development. Brussee describes the current climate as "rough" and unsustainable.
Production budgets keep inflating, and the risk of failure grows with each additional dollar spent. "We need new workflows that cut costs, let smaller teams ship faster, and reduce the financial gamble for studios," he explains. De Jong, Immens’ chief product officer, points out that the engine space has become overly standardized and consolidated. While that consolidation has given developers a solid base, it also stifles innovation.
"The industry faces many challenges, and repeating the same old processes won’t solve them. We need genuine innovation, not more of the same," he says. A major criticism of existing engines is their monolithic nature.
Developers must adapt to proprietary file formats and rigid pipelines. De Jong envisions an engine that bends to the creator’s will, not the other way around. "Flexibility is key.
You should be able to swap components, add new tools, and tailor the interface to your exact workflow. If I need a shortcut or a custom UI element for my team, I can build it into the engine without fighting the underlying system." Valient acknowledges AI’s limits: while powerful, it can veer off course if left unchecked. Immens therefore emphasizes transparency and control.
"When you use our engine, you always know what it’s doing and why. The history of each operation is logged, making the process repeatable and auditable. You can craft bespoke tools for specific tasks—like generating five characters with a unique trait—in minutes instead of weeks. That level of efficiency was previously unaffordable." The platform is deliberately agnostic about workflow.
De Jong stresses that Immens does not impose a single development methodology. "You decide how much AI to incorporate and where. Our architecture simply provides a solid foundation that can be shaped to your needs, as long as the AI interprets your commands correctly." Interoperability is another pillar of Immens’ design. By adopting open, text‑based standards, the engine can seamlessly exchange data with other tools such as Blender, Maya, or any generative‑AI pipeline.
"When files are human‑readable, any system can parse them. This opens the door for smarter interfaces across the entire toolchain, something proprietary engines have struggled to achieve," Brussee notes.
There is a vocal backlash against AI in game creation, often fueled by sensational claims that a single prompt could spawn a Grand Theft Auto‑scale experience. Immens’ founders see such hype as premature. While they acknowledge that a future "click‑to‑game" engine might exist, they view AI primarily as an accelerator, not a replacement for human creativity. "AI makes everyone better, not the sole author," Valient says.
"It’s a tool, and like any tool, it can be misused, but the responsibility lies with us to apply it ethically." Economic anxieties also swirl around AI, with many fearing a bubble of over‑valued startups. Valient draws a parallel to the dot‑com era: the internet didn’t disappear; many shaky companies fell, but the underlying technology endured. "We’re building a solid engine first; AI simply lets us iterate faster and dream bigger.
Whether it’s a bubble is unknown, but history shows useful tech survives." Funding remains modest. Immens has secured its "first commitments" but has not disclosed amounts, describing the target as "reasonable." Brussee warns against excessive capital, noting that too much money can breed complacency.
The company remains lean—just the three founders and a handful of helpers—by design. "Engine development is complex, but you don’t need a thousand‑person army. A focused team can make smarter decisions faster.
At the same time, we must time our growth to capture the current window of opportunity created by AI advances." Immens is currently delivering a proof‑of‑concept demo that showcases a generative‑AI‑driven editing workflow, slated for release later this month. The timeline has already outpaced their original estimate: what was projected to take until year‑end is now arriving in half that time. Brussee admits that predicting exact milestones is difficult when the technology accelerates itself.
The business model is still under discussion. While they admire Epic’s "we succeed when you succeed" revenue share, they consider it premature to commit to a specific approach.
Ultimately, Brussee hopes Immens will enable creators to push the medium forward, fostering more artistic risk‑taking and innovation. "We love games and want to see more daring, expressive experiences. If our engine helps make that possible, it would be amazing," he concludes.