For years, Unity and Unreal have ruled the game‑development landscape, powering roughly 70 % of the titles that appeared on Steam in 2025. While open‑source alternatives like Godot have gained traction, and a handful of studios cling to proprietary solutions such as Capcom’s RE Engine, the market has largely been a duopoly. Against this backdrop, three seasoned industry veterans—Arjan Brussee, Sjoerd De Jong, and Michal Valient—have launched Immens, a startup intent on delivering a fresh, AI‑enhanced engine that challenges the status quo.
The founders’ résumés read like a who’s‑who of modern game development. Brussee helped build the original Quake engine and later co‑founded Guerrilla Games; De Jong spent years at Epic Games, contributing to Unreal’s evolution; Valient’s experience spans Apple’s internal tools and leadership roles at Boss Key. Together they argue that the current engine ecosystem, while stable, has become complacent and is failing to address the escalating costs and complexity that plague small studios. In a recent interview with GamesIndustry.biz, Brussee explained that the timing feels right for a new engine.
“A few years ago the idea of an AI‑augmented workflow was more fantasy than reality,” he said. “Now, with AI‑supported programming, we can start from a clean slate and still deliver full‑featured tools quickly, while keeping tight control over the process.” Valient, Immens’s chief technology officer, clarified that their use of AI differs from the hype‑driven “prompt‑to‑asset” narrative. Instead of treating AI as a magic wand that spits out finished content, Immens leverages AI’s ability to understand large codebases and data structures, making the engine itself highly extensible.
“If we design the underlying architecture with AI in mind, even a solo developer can add a custom particle system or a bespoke physics module without wrestling with opaque scripting layers,” he noted. This extensibility, he argued, is the core value proposition: AI becomes a catalyst for rapid iteration rather than a replacement for human creativity. The motivation behind Immens is also economic.
Brussee described the current market as “rough” and warned that development budgets are inflating faster than revenue streams. “Games are getting more expensive to make, and the risk to studios is growing,” he said.
“We need new workflows that shrink costs, let smaller teams ship faster, and reduce the financial pressure that threatens the livelihood of creators.” De Jong echoed this sentiment, pointing out that the engine space has entered a phase of “standardisation and consolidation.” While standardisation has provided a reliable foundation, he believes the industry now needs genuine innovation. “Continuing to do things the way they’ve always been done won’t solve the challenges we face,” he argued. “We need a different approach—one that embraces flexibility, modularity, and AI‑driven customization.” A key criticism of existing engines is their monolithic nature.
Developers often must conform to proprietary file formats and rigid pipelines, limiting creative freedom. De Jong envisions an engine that bends to the user’s needs, allowing developers to swap, append, or rewrite components at will.
“Imagine being able to craft a toolset that mirrors your personal workflow—exact shortcuts, interfaces, and features tailored to your project,” he explained. “That level of personalization is what AI can unlock.” Valient also warned that AI, while powerful, can “go off the rails” if left unchecked. Immens therefore emphasizes transparency: users can see exactly what the engine is doing, review its decision history, and ensure repeatable outcomes. This control is crucial when automating tasks such as generating multiple character variations with specific traits—work that once took weeks can now be prototyped over a coffee break and refined as needed.
Flexibility is baked into Immens’s architecture. The team refuses to impose a single workflow, instead offering a framework that lets studios decide how much AI to integrate and where.
“You choose the degree of automation,” De Jong said. “Our job is to make sure the AI understands the context correctly, but the creative direction remains in your hands.” Interoperability is another pillar of the project. By adopting open, text‑based standards, Immens aims to speak fluently with tools like Blender, Maya, and other generative pipelines.
Brussee highlighted that “when files are human‑readable, any AI can parse and manipulate them,” opening the door to seamless data exchange and smarter interfaces across the development stack. The broader industry conversation around AI is polarized. Some pundits hype “click‑to‑game” engines that could conjure a Grand Theft Auto‑scale experience from a single prompt, while others fear job displacement and artistic dilution.
Immens positions its technology as a “tool, not a replacement.” Valient believes AI will elevate the craft: “Big games and indie experiments alike will benefit because AI makes everyone better.” He acknowledges the disruptive perception but stresses responsible usage. Economic anxieties also loom.
Critics label the AI boom a bubble, citing inflated valuations and uncertain returns. Valient draws a parallel to the dot‑com era, noting that while many companies vanished, the underlying internet persisted and flourished. “We’re focused on building a solid engine; AI simply accelerates our vision,” he said. “Whether the market is a bubble is unknown, but history shows valuable technology survives beyond hype.” Funding remains modest.
Immens has secured “first commitments” but has not disclosed amounts, and Brussee cautions against excessive capital that could breed complacency. “Startups can become lazy with too much money,” he laughed.
“Scrappiness drives ingenuity.” The team remains lean—just the three founders plus a handful of helpers—by design. De Jong explains that a massive crew would not necessarily translate to faster progress; instead, a small, focused group can make deliberate architectural decisions and iterate efficiently. Balancing the need for talent with the limited window of opportunity presented by AI’s rise is a strategic challenge they are navigating. Immens is currently targeting a proof‑of‑concept demo that showcases a generative‑AI‑driven editing workflow, slated for release within the month.
The timeline has already outpaced their original projection of a year‑long development cycle, underscoring the speed gains they claim AI can deliver. Regarding business models, Brussee admires Epic Games’ “we succeed when you succeed” licensing approach but admits it’s too early to commit to a specific strategy. Ultimately, the founders hope Immens will empower creators to push artistic boundaries, take risks, and inject fresh innovation into the medium.
“We love games and want to see more daring, expressive experiences,” Brussee concluded. “If our engine helps developers bring bold ideas to life, that would be amazing.”