Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund is reportedly in talks to acquire Unity, the game engine maker, in a buyout that Kotaku pegs at $21.5 billion. Investment firm Silver Lake — the PIF's partner in this year's $55 billion leveraged buyout of Electronic Arts — is again involved, according to GamesRadar+.

The talks, if they progress, would dramatically expand Saudi influence over the games industry just months after the EA deal closed. Where EA gave the consortium a major publisher, Unity would hand it infrastructure: the engine powers a huge share of mobile, indie, and mid-tier games, and its tools reach far beyond gaming into film, automotive, and simulation.

That's exactly what makes the reported deal contentious. The EA acquisition already drew criticism over the Saudi government's growing grip on gaming, and an engine-level stake raises different questions than owning a publisher — Unity sits in the middle of thousands of studios' pipelines and monetization stacks.

Nothing is final; the reports describe talks rather than an agreement. Unity, which weathered its own developer-trust crisis over runtime fees in 2023, has not commented.