For many years, Unity and Unreal have been the dominant forces in game development, accounting for roughly 70% of the titles released on Steam in 2025. While open‑source alternatives like Godot have begun to gain traction, most large studios still rely on proprietary solutions—Capcom’s RE Engine being a prime example—leaving Unity and Unreal with a near‑monopoly on the engine market. Enter Immens, a startup founded by three seasoned veterans—Arjan Brussee, Sjoerd De Jong, and Michal Valient—who believe there is still room for a fresh engine that addresses the shortcomings of the status quo. Their résumés read like a who’s‑who of the industry, featuring stints at Epic Games (the creators of Unreal), Guerrilla Games, Boss Key, and even Apple.
Together, they are setting out to challenge the entrenched giants. In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, Brussee explained that the timing feels right for a new engine because “the landscape has changed in ways that didn’t exist a few years ago.” He highlighted the role of AI‑assisted programming, noting that developers can now start building from a clean slate with far more guidance and automation than was previously possible. "With AI‑supported programming, you can probably start making things from scratch again," he said.
"Under a lot of guidance and control, you can build something that can bring full functionality fast." Valient, Immens’ chief technology officer, clarified that the company’s use of AI is not about generating content through vague prompts. Instead, the AI is woven into the engine’s architecture to make it highly extensible.
"The AI in Immens is about building the engine in a way that is really extensible," he explained. "If we design the code base with this in mind, then even smaller teams or individuals can come and extend the engine.
They are not just limited to a bit of scripting that they can do. They can come in and say: ‘I want to make this game.
I really want my custom particle system. Let me add it there.’" The motivation behind this ambitious project stems from the current economic pressures facing game developers.
Brussee described the market as "rough," emphasizing that development costs are spiralling and that many studios struggle to stay afloat. "It's really hard to be successful making games," he said. "They're getting ever more expensive. You need to do something to break out of that cycle.
Can we find new ways of working? Can we find more efficient ways of working, to help decrease the cost and make games with fewer people in a faster time with smaller budgets so you're not risking your livelihood, your studio, everything?" De Jong, Immens’ chief product officer, pointed out that the engine space has become overly standardized and consolidated.
While this has provided a solid foundation, he argues that the industry now needs innovation rather than further standardisation. "Now we're at the point where the industry is facing a number of different challenges, and just continuing to do things as we've done before is not really it," he said. "Now we need innovation, not standardisation.
That's what we're pushing for. There must be a different way." One of the pain points De Jong highlighted is the monolithic nature of existing engines.
Developers are forced to adapt to proprietary file formats and rigid workflows. By contrast, an AI‑aware engine could adapt to the developer’s needs, offering interchangeable components, custom tools, and a workflow that mirrors the creator’s own preferences. "It needs to be very flexible," he noted.
"You can interchange things. You can append things. You can modify things.
You can create your own tools for what you need." Valient also warned that AI, while powerful, can quickly go off the rails if left unchecked. Immens therefore aims to keep the user in full control, providing transparent histories of AI actions so that developers can reproduce results reliably.
"We are building Immens so that when you are using the engine, you are in control of what it is doing," he said. "You know what it's doing. You know the history of how it's doing it, so that you know it is repeatable." The flexibility promise extends to the engine’s overall architecture. De Jong emphasized that Immens does not force a single workflow on its users; instead, the framework is designed to let developers decide how much AI to incorporate and where.
"It's up to you how you want to use it," he added. "We want to make sure that the framework and architecture is set up so that you can decide how you want to work, including how much AI you want to use and where you want to use AI. But we do need to make sure that the AI understands things correctly." Interoperability is another cornerstone of Immens’ design. By adopting open, text‑based standards, the engine can seamlessly exchange data with tools like Blender, Maya, or any generative‑AI pipeline.
Brussee explained that when files are human‑readable, any AI can parse and manipulate them, opening the door to smarter, cross‑tool workflows. "The moment you have files that are text based, anything can read it," he said. "The AI can read files and do things with it. There are actually really interesting open standards being built." The broader conversation about AI in game development is often polarized.
Some commentators on LinkedIn hype the idea of “click‑to‑game” experiences, suggesting that a single prompt could spawn a Grand Theft Auto‑scale title. Immens acknowledges that such extreme visions may eventually be possible, but they view AI primarily as a productivity enhancer, not a replacement for human creativity. "The big games and everything in between will be done because AI made everybody better," Valient remarked. "It has negative connotations right now because it is disrupting everything at a scale that nobody has seen." De Jong added a note of responsibility: "As an industry, we can use AI in a responsible and productive way, and we have the responsibility to try and figure it out.
It's a tool. Any tool humanity has ever made could be used in a negative way too. It's our responsibility not to." Economic concerns also swirl around AI, with many fearing a bubble of over‑valued startups.
Valient compared the situation to the dot‑com era, arguing that while some companies will fall, the underlying technology will endure. "With the dot‑com bubble, did the internet go away? No. All the ‘I have a domain, give me money’ companies went away.
That's probably what happens. There are a lot of companies that will probably not survive.
There's a lot of great technology and a lot of great products that will because they are simply good. That's what we are trying to do." Funding for Immens remains modest. The founders have secured initial commitments but have not disclosed exact figures, describing the amount as "reasonable." Brussee cautioned against over‑funding, noting that excess capital can breed complacency: "There's always a danger with being a startup that you can have too much money. You also get lazy, when you need to be scrappy." The team itself remains tiny—just the three founders plus a handful of helpers—by design.
De Jong explained that building a sophisticated engine requires focused decision‑making rather than a massive workforce. "You need a small set of people to gradually build it up and come to certain decisions and realisations. That takes time," he said. "On the other hand, there is a window of opportunity here over the next few years because of all the changes happening with the industry, with AI coming up." Immens is currently racing toward a proof‑of‑concept demo that showcases a generative‑AI‑driven editing workflow.
The goal is to release this demo within the month, a timeline that Brussee says is already twice as fast as initially projected. "When we started in April, we thought that would probably take us until the end of the year. So we're already two times faster than we anticipated we would go," he noted. Business‑model discussions are still in their infancy.
While Immens admires Epic’s “we succeed when you succeed” licensing approach, they have not committed to any specific model yet. Ultimately, Brussee hopes the engine will empower creators to push the medium forward.
"We all love games. We love complex expressions of the art form and want to see more of that," he said. "We want to see more creativity and more risk‑taking.
Hopefully we can see innovation in games that will be built on this kind of tech. That would be amazing."