Leslie Benzies, former president of Rockstar North and current head of Build a Rocket Boy, reportedly told the staff that the problems affecting the studio and MindsEye are partly due to vague “internal and external saboteurs.”
MindsEye was released on PC and consoles last June and received an extremely negative reception from both the press and the public. On Metacritic, it has a poor average score of 38, which drops to 28 for the PS5 version. Reviews highlight not only significant technical issues but also a weak story, uninspired open-world design, and repetitive combat.
With such negative feedback, sales seem to show the same disappointment. According to a report from IGN, Build a Rocket Boy started laying off workers, notifying its roughly 300 employees via email that their jobs were at risk.
Now, some anonymous sources report that Benzies spoke to the staff on July 2nd for the first time since the launch of MindsEye, during a brief video call. According to two employees who asked to remain anonymous to protect their careers, he promised that the studio would recover and relaunch MindsEye, attributing the difficulties to internal and external sabotage.
As mentioned earlier, Benzies did not provide further details about these alleged saboteurs, and we may never know exactly what happened. What is certain, however, is that Build a Rocket Boy faces a tough challenge in rebuilding MindsEye’s reputation. Recovering from such a disastrous launch will not be easy.
