For years, Unity and Unreal have ruled the game‑development landscape, together powering roughly 70% of the titles that landed on Steam in 2025. While Godot has carved out a modest niche and some studios cling to proprietary solutions—Capcom’s RE Engine being a prime example—the market has largely settled into a duopoly.
Against this backdrop, three seasoned industry veterans—Arjan Brussee, Sjoerd De Jong, and Michal Valient—have launched Immens, a fresh game engine built around artificial intelligence, with the ambition to break the prevailing cycle of ever‑rising costs and shrinking margins. The founders’ résumés read like a who's‑who of modern game development: experience at Epic Games (the creators of Unreal), Guerrilla Games, Boss Key, and even Apple. Their combined expertise gives them a unique perspective on why the status quo feels increasingly inadequate.
In a recent interview with GamesIndustry.biz, Brussee argued that the timing is now right for a new engine because "the tools that existed a few years ago simply aren’t enough". He believes AI‑augmented programming can restore the sense of building something from the ground up, allowing developers to achieve full‑featured functionality with far less manual effort.
Valient, Immens’s chief technology officer, clarifies that the AI component is not about "prompt‑to‑code" magic tricks that many hype‑driven discussions focus on. Instead, the AI is woven into the engine’s architecture to make the codebase highly extensible.
"If we design the engine 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 explains. The goal is to let creators extend the engine quickly, using AI as an accelerator rather than a replacement for thoughtful engineering. The motivation behind Immens is rooted in the harsh economic realities of modern game production. Brussee describes the current climate as "rough" and warns that development budgets are ballooning while teams shrink.
"We need new ways of working that lower costs and shorten timelines, so studios don’t risk everything on a single title," he says. De Jong, the chief product officer, adds that the engine market has become overly "standardised and consolidated". While that consolidation has provided a stable foundation, it also stifles innovation.
"The industry now faces a series of challenges that can’t be solved by merely iterating on the same old tools," he asserts. "We need breakthrough ideas, not just more of the same." One of the criticisms De Jong levels at existing engines is their "monolithic approach".
Developers must conform to proprietary file formats and rigid pipelines, which can hinder creativity. With AI, Immens aims to become an engine that adapts to the developer, not the other way around.
"Flexibility is key," he says. "You should be able to swap modules, append new features, or craft entirely custom tools that match your workflow, shortcuts, and interface preferences." Valient acknowledges that AI is a double‑edged sword. While it is "really powerful", it can also veer off course if left unchecked. To mitigate this, Immens is built to keep the user in the driver’s seat.
Every AI‑generated action is logged, reproducible, and transparent, allowing developers to audit and refine the process. This level of control transforms what used to be weeks‑long tasks—like generating five characters with specific traits—into rapid, coffee‑break iterations.
The result is a dramatically cheaper and faster workflow that can be discarded after use, freeing resources for the next creative challenge. Immens does not enforce a single workflow or a prescribed amount of AI involvement. The architecture is deliberately modular, giving teams the freedom to decide how much AI assistance they want and where to apply it.
De Jong emphasizes that the engine also embraces open standards, ensuring seamless interoperability with tools such as Blender, Maya, or any generative‑art platform. "When files are text‑based, any program can read them," Brussee notes. "That openness lets AI parse and manipulate assets across the entire pipeline, something closed‑source engines have struggled with." The broader industry reaction to AI in game development is mixed. Some commentators predict a future where entire games can be spawned from a single prompt—a "click‑to‑game" fantasy that many view with skepticism.
Immens’s team sees AI more modestly, as a powerful assistant rather than a replacement for human creativity. Valient believes AI will elevate the craft: "Big games and indie experiments alike will benefit because AI makes everyone better." Economic concerns also loom large. Critics warn that AI‑centric startups could be part of a speculative bubble, with inflated valuations and shaky fundamentals. Valient counters that while bubbles burst, the underlying technology endures—just as the internet survived the dot‑com crash.
"We’re focused on building a solid engine; AI simply helps us iterate faster and dream bigger," he says. Whether the market is overheated remains uncertain, but Immens is positioning itself to weather any downturn by delivering genuine value.
Funding for Immens is still in its early stages. The founders have secured initial commitments but have not disclosed exact figures, describing the amount as "reasonable". Brussee cautions against over‑capitalisation, noting that excessive cash can breed complacency. "Startups need to stay scrappy," he laughs, emphasizing the importance of lean operations.
The company remains tiny—just the three founders plus a handful of helpers—by design. De Jong explains that building an engine is a complex, iterative process that benefits from a focused, small team making deliberate decisions. At the same time, they recognize a narrow window of opportunity as AI reshapes the industry, and they must balance speed, talent, and funding to seize it. Immens is currently targeting 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 expectations; what they projected for year‑end is now arriving months ahead of schedule. While the ultimate business model is still under discussion, Brussee admires Epic’s "we succeed when you succeed" philosophy but admits it is too early to commit to a specific revenue structure. Ultimately, the trio hopes Immens will enable creators to push the artistic and technical boundaries of games. "We love games and want to see more risk‑taking, more creativity," Brussee concludes.
"If our engine can help bring that vision to life, that would be amazing."