BRUTAL is a free, open-source C#/.NET framework for building games or the foundations of a custom engine. Ahwoo and RocketWerkz announced its release in Auckland on October 15, 2026, with DayZ creator Dean Hall associated with the project. Unlike a conventional game engine, BRUTAL does not arrive with an editor, scene graph or ready-made renderer. It gives experienced programmers low-level building blocks and leaves the rest of the technology stack to each team.
What BRUTAL is—and what it is not
BRUTAL sits below the level of an integrated engine such as Unity, Unreal or Godot. Its central component is a custom interop layer that connects modern C# and .NET code to native APIs and high-performance C and C++ libraries, including Vulkan. Around that layer are supporting libraries for mathematics, memory management, strings, collections, job scheduling, logging and localisation.
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That description makes BRUTAL a framework rather than a finished engine. The repository explicitly says developers write their own stack. There is no general-purpose editor for laying out scenes, no prescribed entity or component architecture, and no renderer supplied as a complete engine subsystem. A team must select or build those pieces and decide how they fit together.
Why the distinction matters
With an integrated engine, much of the architecture is already chosen: the editor, asset pipeline, scene representation, rendering workflow and debugging tools are designed to work together. BRUTAL instead provides a foundation on which a studio can create those systems itself. That can expose more of the machine and make unusual designs possible, but it also moves a large amount of engineering work from the engine vendor to the game team.
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Platforms and technical control
Ahwoo lists Windows, Linux and macOS as BRUTAL targets, and identifies the same three targets for every package. The framework’s native interop approach is intended to let teams work close to platform APIs and control allocations, scheduling and other performance-sensitive behavior. Vulkan support is part of the native-library coverage, rather than evidence that BRUTAL includes a finished Vulkan renderer.
The project deliberately permits unmanaged memory and unsafe code where appropriate. Those choices can reduce abstraction overhead and give programmers precise control, but they also remove many safety nets. Memory lifetime, thread correctness, error handling and subsystem boundaries become responsibilities of the studio that adopts the framework.
Who is already using it?
The release announcement says BRUTAL currently powers six game projects across three studios. Named projects include three from RocketWerkz—Kitten Space Agency, Art of the Rail and Torpedia—plus Ludeon Studios’ Waylith engine for RimWorld, Floating Origin Interactive’s Afterskies and a project from Kerbal Space Program creator Felipe Falanghe.
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The announcement also identifies RocketWerkz titles ICARUS, Stationeers and Kitten Space Agency in its discussion of the studio’s work, and reports that ICARUS had sold more than 3.3 million units, according to RocketWerkz’s 2026 statement. That figure describes the game, not a BRUTAL performance measurement.
What performance evidence exists?
The strongest published figures come from Ludeon Studios’ own tests during the Unity-to-Waylith move. They are useful indications of what one experienced team achieved, not independent benchmarks or guarantees for every BRUTAL project.
| Test reported by Ludeon | Result | How to read it |
|---|---|---|
| Unity-to-Waylith migration | 2–4× performance improvement | Ludeon’s reported range for its migration, under its own test conditions |
| Late-game colony | 2.2× performance versus version 1.6 | A comparison from Ludeon’s project, not a general engine score |
| 1,500-mod pack loading | Reduced from 14 minutes to 6 minutes | A loading-time result reported by Ludeon for its mod-heavy workload |
These results do not establish that BRUTAL is automatically faster than every commercial or open-source engine. They show that a team able to redesign its systems and control its technology stack can obtain substantial gains in a particular workload. Porting effort, renderer design, data layout, tooling and content all affect the outcome.
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Can BRUTAL be used in a commercial game?
Yes. BRUTAL is free to use, modify and distribute, including in commercial games, and it carries no royalties. Its licence is MIT-based, but the repository says it has not yet received OSI approval. Third-party components bundled with or used alongside the framework retain their own licence requirements.
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- Include the BRUTAL copyright notice in the game’s credits, or an equivalent attribution.
- Show the BRUTAL logo before gameplay.
- Ship a
NOTICE.txtfile. - Review every third-party component’s licence separately; BRUTAL’s terms do not replace those obligations.
Studios should preserve the exact licence text and notices that accompany the version they ship, and have legal or compliance staff check how the logo, credits and notice file fit their release process.
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Is BRUTAL a Unity or Unreal alternative?
It is an alternative in the broad sense that a team could choose it instead of an integrated engine, but it is not a drop-in replacement. The practical trade-offs are different:
| Decision axis | BRUTAL | Integrated engines such as Unity, Unreal or Godot |
|---|---|---|
| Abstraction level | Low-level C#/.NET framework with native interop | Engine-level systems and editor workflows supplied together |
| Architecture | The studio builds its own stack, renderer and core systems | The engine supplies established systems that teams configure and extend |
| Control | Direct access to native APIs, Vulkan-related libraries and allocation decisions | More behavior is mediated by engine abstractions and tooling |
| Team burden | Source ownership, debugging, architecture and long-term maintenance remain with the team | More infrastructure is ready on day one, with less control over its internal design |
| Licensing | Commercial use without royalties, subject to BRUTAL attribution and third-party notices | Terms depend on the engine, edition and current vendor policy |
| Modding | No mod architecture is imposed; the game team designs it | Mod workflows depend on the selected engine and the game’s implementation |
Ludeon’s Waylith work reportedly preserved most existing RimWorld mods, but that is evidence of Ludeon’s compatibility work, not a built-in BRUTAL feature. A new studio would need to design and maintain its own mod interfaces.
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How difficult is BRUTAL to use?
The official materials target experienced programmers. Rian Drake, BRUTAL’s head of engineering at Ahwoo, described it plainly: “There are no guardrails. You’re responsible for the systems you build and the mistakes you make, but you also have the control to put things right.”
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In practice, the difficulty depends on whether a team wants a framework or a finished production environment. A studio with engine programmers, graphics expertise and an existing toolchain can use BRUTAL to replace or reshape foundational technology. A small team looking for an editor, drag-and-drop scene authoring, a ready asset pipeline and turnkey rendering will have to build those capabilities—or choose a higher-level engine.
A realistic adoption sequence
- Audit the team. Confirm that someone can own native interop, unsafe C# code, memory management, graphics and build infrastructure.
- Define the stack. Decide which renderer, asset pipeline, scene or world model, scripting model, audio system and editor tools you will provide yourself or obtain separately.
- Prototype platform boundaries. Validate Windows, Linux and macOS builds, native library loading and your allocation and job-scheduling strategy before committing production content.
- Build diagnostics early. Add logging, crash reporting, profiling and memory checks because the framework does not supply engine guardrails.
- Plan maintenance. Assign ownership for upgrades, third-party licences, platform changes and every subsystem your team creates around BRUTAL.
Why Dean Hall says the release matters
Hall has framed BRUTAL as an independence option rather than a universal recommendation. “I’m not suggesting everyone should make their own game engine,” he said. “I’m suggesting every developer should have the option to do so, without having to spend four years building the foundations first.” The project’s repository makes the same point more compactly: “You are only as independent as your tools are.”
That is BRUTAL’s central proposition. It gives studios a source-available, royalty-free foundation and a path to owning more of their technology, while asking them to accept the engineering cost that integrated engines normally absorb. For teams prepared to carry that cost, it can be the start of a custom engine. For teams seeking a complete game-making environment, it is deliberately not one.
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