Leslie Benzies Plans to "Relaunch" MindsEye and Blames Saboteurs for Its Troubles

Build A Rocket Boy (BARB), the studio founded by former GTA producer Leslie Benzies, has found itself in a tough spot after the disastrous launch of its game MindsEye. As a result, the company has sent out redundancy notices to around 300 UK-based employees. Similar notices were also sent to staff at PlayFusion, a studio acquired by Build A Rocket Boy at the end of 2024. PlayFusion is working on a separate title — the shooter Ascendant, which was originally slated for a 2025 release.

Following the launch of MindsEye, the studio was hit with a wave of criticism over technical issues, AI bugs, and poor performance. BARB admitted the situation was devastating and began rolling out patches. Sponsored streams were canceled, and players demanded refunds — even from Sony. On Steam, the game peaked at just 3,300 players at launch, dropping to fewer than 50 concurrent players over time. MindsEye now holds mostly negative reviews.

Recently, Leslie Benzies addressed employees directly for the first time since release, speaking via video call. According to IGN, he promised a relaunch of MindsEye and claimed that both internal and external saboteurs had impacted the studio and the game. This echoes earlier statements from another BARB executive, Mark Gerhard, who blamed anonymous individuals and bots for running a campaign against the studio.

Despite the crisis, there is still hope within the studio for MindsEye’s revival and future success. However, the layoffs and current situation cast doubt on the realism of these plans, especially with the promised multiplayer mode and further content updates still on the table.

This week, the studio released the third patch for the console versions of the game, with the PC update coming soon.