Multiple developers of the disastrous MindsEye have said they’ve been laid off, casting doubt over the future of its controversial developer, Build A Rocket Boy.
Story-driven action adventure game MindsEye was initially designed to be a part of Everywhere, the ‘Roblox for adults’ creation platform led by former Grand Theft Auto design chief Leslie Benzies. BARB eventually switched to focus on MindsEye, with the company ballooning in size to over 500 staff at peak.
But MindsEye flopped hard when it came out in June 2025, with players calling it “broken,” “buggy,” and “the worst game of 2025.” Soon after, BARB said it was “heartbroken” over the issues players had faced with the game, and promised to release a series of patches to fix the significant performance problems, glitches, and AI behavior bugs. Benzies told staff that the studio would bounce back and relaunch MindsEye, blaming its struggles on internal and external “saboteurs,” among other things. CEO Mark Gerhard said the studio had been investigating what he called “criminal activity” that took place around the launch of the game.
In July last year, IGN reported that the Scottish studio had issued at-risk of redundancy emails to its then around 300-strong UK workforce. Subsequent rounds of layoffs followed, and this summer, fired staff protested outside the studio over an “all-expenses-paid playtest day.”
BARB attempted to relaunch MindsEye with what was called the “Blacklisted” update, but it failed to move the needle. Subsequent updates and a last-ditch 50% off Steam sale have similarly fallen on deaf ears. While console player numbers are unavailable, MindsEye had a 24-hour peak Steam concurrent player count of just 16.
The extent of the layoffs is unclear at this stage, with one source familiar with the studio telling IGN that the company may not be dissolved even if all staff are let go. Either way, there are now serious questions over the future of the studio and MindsEye itself. IGN has asked BARB for comment.
Benzies was a crucial member of the Grand Theft Auto development team at Rockstar, and is considered one of the key architects of its enormous success. He left in 2016 amid a legal row over unpaid royalties that was eventually settled out of court. With the GTA link in place, BARB attracted more than £233 million ($313 million) of investment by 2024. Hitman developer IO Interactive snapped up publishing rights.
BARB’s latest financial statements, made up to September 30, 2025, reveal it had generated revenue of £4.6 million ($6.1 million), but had total operating costs of £52.1 million ($70 million). It declared a net loss of £36.2 million ($48.6 million) for the period.
In May, Strauss Zelnick, boss of Rockstar parent company Take-Two, issued what sounded like a nod to BARB’s struggles. “Making hits seems to get harder and harder and harder as entertainment industries mature,” Zelnick said, speaking at the TD Cowen 54th Annual Technology, Media & Telecom Conference.
“The folks at Rockstar seem to be able to make these massive hits, and lots of other people have tried. Lots and lots, including former Rockstar employees. And so far, they haven’t been able to do it.”
Wesley Yin-Poole
Director, News
Wesley is Director, News at IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
