For more than a decade, Unity and Unreal have been the go‑to platforms for video‑game creators, accounting for roughly 70 % of all titles released on Steam in 2025. While open‑source alternatives like Godot have made notable strides, the majority of large studios still cling to proprietary solutions—Capcom’s RE Engine being a prime example—leaving Unity and Unreal with a near‑monopoly on the engine market.
Enter Immersive (Immens), the brainchild of three seasoned veterans—Arjan Brussee, Sjoerd De Jong, and Michal Valient—who believe there is still room for a fresh, more adaptable engine. Their résumés read like a who's‑who of the industry: experience at Epic Games (the creators of Unreal), Guerrilla Games, Boss Key, Apple, and other heavyweight studios. Together they aim to challenge the entrenched giants with a platform built around artificial intelligence. In a recent interview with GamesIndustry.biz, Brussee explained that the timing feels right for a new engine because “the tools that existed a couple of years ago simply aren’t enough any more.” He argues that AI‑assisted programming can let developers start from a clean slate, providing “a lot of guidance and control” while still delivering full‑featured results quickly.
Valient, Immens’s chief technology officer, is careful to differentiate their approach from the hype‑driven “prompt‑to‑content” narrative that dominates many AI conversations. He stresses that Immens isn’t about magically conjuring assets with a single line of text. Instead, the AI is woven into the engine’s architecture to make the codebase highly extensible. "If we design the code with AI in mind, even a solo developer can plug in a custom particle system or a bespoke gameplay mechanic without wrestling with opaque scripting layers," he says.
The goal is to let creators use AI as a productivity accelerator, not as a replacement for thoughtful engineering. The motivation behind this ambitious project is the increasingly hostile economics of game development. Brussee describes the current climate as "rough," noting that production budgets keep swelling while the margin for error shrinks. "It’s getting harder to succeed," he warns.
"We need new ways of working that lower costs, speed up iteration, and let smaller teams bring their visions to life without risking everything." De Jong, Immens’s chief product officer, observes that the engine landscape has become overly standardized and consolidated. While that consolidation has provided a stable foundation, it also stifles innovation. "The industry faces a host of challenges, and simply iterating on the same old pipelines isn’t enough. We need breakthrough ideas, not more of the same," he asserts.
One of the pain points he highlights is the "monolithic" nature of existing engines. Developers are forced to conform to proprietary file formats and rigid toolchains, which can hamper creativity. With AI, De Jong envisions an engine that bends to the developer’s will.
"Flexibility is key," he explains. "You should be able to swap modules, append new features, or build entirely custom tools that match your workflow—down to the exact shortcuts, UI layout, and feature set you need for your project." Valient acknowledges that AI is a double‑edged sword. While it is "really powerful," it can also veer off course if left unchecked.
Immens therefore places a strong emphasis on transparency and control. "When you use the engine, you always know what it’s doing, why it made a decision, and you can reproduce that behavior," he says. This auditability is crucial for maintaining a reliable development pipeline, especially when AI generates content on the fly. The team also stresses the importance of rapid prototyping.
Tasks that once required weeks of manual labor—like generating five characters with specific traits—can now be imagined over a coffee break and materialized with a custom AI‑driven tool. Such workflows, once prohibitively expensive, become affordable and repeatable, opening the door for more experimental game designs.
Immens is deliberately built without imposing a single workflow. De Jong says the framework is modular, allowing studios to decide how much AI to integrate and where. "You can pick and choose the AI components that make sense for your pipeline, while still retaining full control over the underlying architecture," he notes. Interoperability is another pillar of the platform.
By embracing open, text‑based standards, Immens ensures that assets from tools like Blender, Maya, or any generative‑AI suite can be imported seamlessly. "If a file is human‑readable, any engine—or AI—can parse it," Brussee explains.
This openness contrasts with many proprietary engines that act as closed ecosystems, making cross‑tool collaboration cumbersome. The broader industry reaction to AI in game development is mixed.
Some commentators on LinkedIn predict a future where entire open‑world experiences can be conjured with a single prompt—a vision that many see as unrealistic hype. Immens’s founders temper those expectations, describing AI as a powerful assistant rather than a magic wand. Valient believes that AI will ultimately make developers better, not replace them: "The big games will still be crafted by talented teams; AI simply amplifies their capabilities." Economic concerns also loom.
Critics warn of an AI bubble, drawing parallels to the dot‑com era. Valient counters that while valuations may be inflated, the underlying technology is here to stay. "The internet didn’t disappear after the dot‑com crash; the successful companies survived because they built solid products.
We aim to do the same—create a genuinely useful engine and let AI accelerate our progress." Funding remains modest. Immens has secured its "first commitments" but has not disclosed amounts, emphasizing that excessive capital can breed complacency.
Brussee jokes that too much money can make a startup lazy, whereas a lean budget forces scrappiness and focus. The company’s current headcount is tiny—just the three founders plus a handful of helpers—by design. De Jong explains the trade‑off: a massive team doesn’t automatically translate to faster engine development; instead, a small, dedicated group can make thoughtful decisions and iterate more nimbly. Timing is critical, and the team believes they have a narrow window to capitalize on AI’s momentum before the market stabilizes.
Immens is now racing toward a proof‑of‑concept demo that showcases "the flow of editing something" using generative AI. The prototype is slated for release this month, already ahead of the original schedule.
"We aimed for an end‑of‑year launch when we started in April, but we’re roughly twice as fast as expected," Brussee reports. Business‑model discussions are still in early stages. While Immens admires Epic’s revenue‑share philosophy—"we succeed when you succeed"—they haven’t committed to any particular licensing scheme yet.
Ultimately, the trio hopes their engine will rekindle creativity and risk‑taking in the industry. "We love games and want to see more daring, artistic expressions," Brussee concludes. "If our technology can help developers push boundaries and innovate, that would be amazing."