MindsEye was one of the most catastrophic game launches of 2025 but the studio refuses to quit: Its ‘most significant post-launch update’ is now live and an expansion is coming later this year

I use the word “catastrophic” quite a lot—it’s one of those things that just happens when you write about videogames for a living—but there are few games more deserving of the term than MindsEye, one of 2025’s biggest flops. A rough pre-release led into an even worse launch: Player counts on Steam were microscopic, layoffs at developer Build a Rocket Boy followed, and the whole thing was clearly, incontrovertibly, and utterly cooked.

And yet. Somehow, here we are with a new update, and a promise of even bigger things to come. As Benoit Blanc famously said, “It makes no damn sense. Compels me, though.”

“After months of continued post-launch support following player and critic feedback, the title receives its most significant post-launch update yet, achieving the studio’s vision for quality and setting the stage for exciting future content updates,” BARB said in today’s press blast.

The studio also promised that, “over the coming months,” it will unveil a new expansion adding “end-game content and enhanced world exploration,” along with a new multiplayer mode.

“I want to thank everyone who’s been playing and sharing feedback, and our dedicated team who have worked incredibly hard to continue to delight our community,” BARB CEO Mark Gerhard enthused. “We’ve listened, we’ve moved quickly, and we’re continuing to refine performance, make continuous improvements, and deliver substantial combat and gameplay enhancements. New content is in development, and we’re committed to steady, meaningful progress.”

I’m not sure I’d say the studio “moved quickly” on it, although that may be in part a matter of perception: MindsEye has been out for eight months and BARB has not been especially communicative about its intentions, beyond vague promises that things are happening. Updates have rolled out, though, and it’s notable that Steam reviews have taken a sharp turn upward: While the overall rating remains “mixed,” recent reviews are “very positive,” and there’s a real sense among them that MindsEye is salvageable.

It’s not all roses, of course. The mood on the MindsEye Discord is somewhat less sunny—doubts about the update’s actual significance (the full patch notes are below, and it seems like a fairly minor update to me) and discontent with BARB’s persistent silence are not hard to find—and there’s no getting around the fact that all of this theater is playing to an empty house. According to SteamDB, there are 17 people playing MindsEye right now, and the peak concurrent player count over the past 24 hours is just 31. And at the end of the day, well, MindsEye is just not a particularly good game.

It is interesting, though, because this whole thing has been so very strange. In May 2025, BARB co-CEO Mark Gerhard accused unknown shadowy forces of waging a negative PR campaign against MindsEye ahead of its release; after it was out, studio founder Leslie Benzies (yes, the former Rockstar guy) said “saboteurs” were responsible for many of its woes.

Developers put out of work after the game flopped pointed the finger at studio leadership, however, accusing both Gerhard and Benzies of “systemic mistreatment, mismanagement, and mishandling of the redundancy process,” and alleging that employees “suffered months of crunch, resulting in some horrific mental and even physical illnesses, beyond the typical widespread burnout.” They also launched legal action against the studio over the alleged redundancy botch.

The most recent bizarre twist in the tale: Just days ago, Gerhard threatened legal action against a YouTuber who made a video about Benzies’ name appearing in the Epstein files. Benzies has denied any wrongdoing, saying that he “never met Jeffrey Epstein” and that the mention of him was related to “a three months consensual relationship” with another individual.

It’s all been such a catastrophe (there’s that word again) that even IO Interactive, MindsEye’s publisher, may have had enough. Insider Gaming reported on January 30 that BARB was ending its publishing deal with IO Interactive; IOI declined to comment on that report, but its name is conspicuously absent from the trailer released today to announce the latest update.

If the deal is over, it’s quite possible IOI’s heart won’t be broken: MindsEye was the first game it published under the IOI Partners label, and it was such a debacle that three months after it came out, IOI CEO Hakan Abrak expressed doubts about ever doing it again.

Anyway, here’s the patch notes.

• Missions & Design 
  • Added extra guidance blips to various missions to improve navigation throughout the campaign. 
  • Robin Hood: Cleared the sandstorm earlier while players are still on the highway to improve visibility and addressed player feedback by adding a scannable marker to assist in finding the caravan in the trailer park. 
  • The Mole: Improved data transfer progression while following Claudia to make the mission play fairer.
  • Big Rocket, Little Boy: Added new objective markers for the Install ODT and viewpoint locations on the rocket loader. 
  • Clash of the Egos: Introduced extra cover points during the Silva segment to keep players less exposed and in the action. 
  • Oh Lily!: Increased Morrison’s health.
  • The Wrong Move: Removed unfair fail condition if the player briefly faces the opposite direction at the beginning of the digging mini game.   
  • A Vital Extraction: Increased Morrison’s health so that the mission plays fairer. 
  • Increased NPC health in multiple missions to avoid unfair mission failures.   
• Audio  
  • Addressed player feedback in the Solitary Confinement mission by improving the social cues in the mini-game. Now provides more reinforcement to the player. 
  • Improved ambience sound effects during cinematics.   
  • Added missing score/music to several cinematics.
• UI/UX  
  • For PC users, Improved the usability of the Companion Drone Controls, descending the drone is now mapped to left CTRL instead of left Shift.
  • Increased the visibility distance of guidance blips from 100m to 1000m. 
  • In  A New Companion mission, added a tooltip outlining the basic controls for the Drone Control.    
  • In the Penthouse Gamble mission, a tooltip has been added to outline how to unholster the companion drone if it is still active. 
• Art & Visuals
  • Improvements made to flesh impact and blood effects.
  • Reduced the default motion blur according to player feedback.
• Animation 
  • Improvements made to the locomotion transition animations.
  • Further improvements to animations when holding weapons.
• General
  • The Free Starter Pack will be removed on 4 February 2026 and will no longer be playable after that date, even if it’s already downloaded.
• Bug Fixes 
• AI & NPC
  • Fixed an issue in The Pursuit of the Orb where enemies may have appeared idle when loading in.   
  • Fixed an issue in Ultra Terminal – Goin’ Haywire where one of the enemy types failed to engage the player.   
  • Fixed an issue where enemies would not aim or react correctly when behind cover. 
• Missions & Design  
  • Fixed various GPS tracking issues.  
  • Fixed issues in the Man Always Burns mission, where the fail conditions could trigger too easily at the checkpoint locations. The trigger volume for the fail condition has been increased to be fairer.   
  • Fixed various visual issues throughout the main campaign.   
• Audio  
  • Fixed an issue where skipping a cutscene could cause the music to cut out. 
• UI/UX  
  • Fixed an issue in the Settings menu where the ‘Reset Defaults’ menu could have become unresponsive. 
• Art & Visuals  
  • Fixed multiple environmental issues throughout Goin Haywire – Ultra Terminal.  
  • Fixed various environmental issues throughout Redrock. 
• Animation  
  • Fixed an issue where animations for AI entering and exiting vehicles looked slightly out of sync.   
  • Fixed an issue where enemies’ weapons could be seen still firing when they were reloading or getting into an aiming position. 
• Performance  
  • Fixed various issues with the Silva Factory’s exterior lights to improve performance.