Juego Studios says engine choice is now a 2027 planning issue for US and Canadian studios

Unreal Engine leads Unity in GDC’s 2026 developer survey, while interest in Steam Deck, Nintendo Switch 2 and PC is reshaping how US and Canadian studios plan hiring, ports and partnerships for 2027. Juego Studios says those shifts make engine selection a business decision, not just a technical one.

Why it matters: - Engine choice now affects hiring, porting and co-development decisions for studios planning 2027 releases in the US and Canada. - Unreal Engine’s lead over Unity, plus rising interest in Steam Deck, Nintendo Switch 2 and PC, means platform strategy and technical staffing are becoming linked. - Layoffs across the industry add pressure to make engine and partner decisions that reduce execution risk.

What happened: - GDC’s 2026 State of the Game Industry survey found Unreal Engine as the primary engine for 42% of respondents and Unity for 30%. - The survey was published in January and drew responses from more than 2,300 game industry professionals worldwide. - Juego Studios broke down the survey results for US and Canadian studios and said the data should inform 2027 planning. - Suman BK, CEO and Co-Founder of Juego Studios, said engine choice has become a planning call because it affects hiring, platform reach and outside-team integration.

The details: - The survey found 28% of developers make or optimize games for Steam Deck, making it the fourth most developed platform in the report. - Interest outpaced current output on new hardware, with 40% interested in making games for Steam Deck and 39% for Nintendo Switch 2. - Among executives, 73% put PC in their top three next-generation platforms. - The survey also found 28% of respondents had been laid off in the past two years, rising to 33% in the US. - Juego Studios said studios should plan around skills, not only the engine, because Unity remains the primary engine for nearly a third of developers. - The company said platform targets should be treated as engine decisions because porting depends on engine-specific knowledge. - Juego Studios said co-development teams should be checked for hands-on experience with the exact engine version, target platforms and build tools. - Juego Studios Inc., the company’s US operating entity, has offices in Plano, Texas, and Aventura, Florida. - The US team works with studios on Unity and Unreal projects in game development, art and porting, while delivery is handled by the wider Juego Studios team in India.

Between the lines: - The survey suggests studios are planning against a tighter labor market and a shifting platform mix at the same time. - That creates a broader strategic question for publishers and studios: whether to build around a team’s current engine expertise or choose the engine that best matches the next platform targets. - The Canadian market faces similar planning pressure, with fewer incentives and recent studio closures adding uncertainty. - The combination of engine fragmentation and platform interest makes outsourcing and co-development more valuable, but also raises the bar for partner diligence.

What’s next: - Studios in the US and Canada are likely to use 2027 planning cycles to decide whether Unreal, Unity or a mixed approach best fits upcoming releases. - More teams may weigh Steam Deck, Switch 2 and PC support earlier in development to avoid expensive porting work later. - Juego Studios is positioning its Unreal and Unity services, plus co-development and porting work, around that planning shift. - The company says its proprietary AI pipeline can shorten the path from idea to MVP by up to 5x in development and support concept exploration in game art.

The bottom line: - The GDC survey points to a simple reality for 2027: engine choice is now a business planning decision tied to hiring, platforms and partnerships, not just code.