MindsEye is a bold vision undermined by bugs and bland gameplay.
Ever since MindsEye was revealed, it has carried the heavy expectations that come with having Leslie Benzies, the renowned former Grand Theft Auto producer, attached to the project. Developed by Build a Rocket Boy, MindsEye was touted as a cinematic, narrative-driven experience embedded within the studio’s wider platform everywhere.
Yet, that in itself was enough for the gaming community to begin to refer to it as another GTA clone. With hype and speculations in one corner of the ring and skepticism in the other, the release’s scuffle only grew bigger as not even higher-ups and content creators got their hands on them early. Now that it’s finally in players’ hands, MindsEye finds itself in a strange place—one where cinematic ambition collides headfirst with frustrating technical issues and uninspired mechanics.
The campaign is easily MindsEye‘s strongest element. While the story takes a while to kick off, with the first hour largely consisting of slow-paced walking and extended cutscenes, it eventually delivers a compelling narrative experience. The developers have described the story as “meaningful, well-paced, and well-crafted”, and that sentiment holds up for the most part.
Once the early exposition is out of the way, the plot picks up, and the cinematic presentation starts to shine. With Watch Dogs and cyberpunk vibes, the game delivers on atmosphere, character development, and emotional moments. While it might not hit the narrative highs of some modern classics, it offers enough to keep you engaged until the end of its 13- to 15-hour runtime.
According to the developers, MindsEye is a linear narrative experience set in a “faux open world.” The game advances by means of mostly planned, mission-based sections with little exploration, but having a visual resemblance to an open world. Walking, driving, cover-based shooting, using drone surveillance gear, and playing mini-games are all things you’ll be doing.
After the campaign, a free roam option is also available, but it’s rather basic and doesn’t have any depth or a living world to interact with. Unfortunately, the majority of your MindsEye actions feel unclean. After the first patch, driving is greatly better; however, it is still stiff. Although you can label enemies with drones, it rarely feels essential, and the initial appeal of drone gaming is fleeting.
Although there is some weapon variation in the game, it is nothing special, and melee combat is not included. Combat in MindsEye functions as a traditional third-person shooter with a cover system. You face off against both human enemies and robots, using an array of firearms that include pistols, shotguns, and rifles.
There’s also a drone tool that you can use for enemy reconnaissance, and combat sometimes involves vehicular shootouts. Explosions, especially from cars and robots, are visually satisfying, and there’s a bit of verticality when drones enter the picture.
However, the enemy AI is laughably bad. Enemies often spawn in one place and stay there, rarely attempting to flank or rush you. The lack of melee combat and the awkward gunplay—where even pistols sound like ray guns—add to the sense that this system wasn’t thoroughly thought out. Ragdoll physics provides some unintentional humor, with enemies either flying off in exaggerated ways or collapsing instantly, depending on the weapon used. Death animations are mostly nonexistent.
The worst sin of MindsEye‘s combat isn’t just its outdated feel; it’s how utterly unpolished it is. Aiming while moving feels clunky, the cover system lacks fluidity, and the weapon feedback is weak. While there’s some appreciation for recoil in a few weapons, most of the shooting feels like a throwback to mid-2000s third-person games, minus the charm.
The enemy AI makes encounters feel repetitive, as foes typically remain stationary and follow a simple shoot-and-hide routine. Even on the hardest difficulty, the combat remains a breeze. Another major problem in the game is the complete lack of perception and reaction from enemy combatants. The enemy-bullets-absorbing combat system greatly kills the intensity of firefights.
Additionally, the only real change would be an increase in enemy health, making the fighting lengthier and not really hard or tactical. This means that any well-executed character animation to express expecting damage from attacks is sometimes left incomplete, saving the animations from ever being acted upon, while opposing gunshots go by with little to no reaction.
It doesn’t feel good to shoot enemies because the weapons have little weight, and the sound design frequently detracts from rather than adds to the immersion. Certain weapons have an excessively sci-fi or toy-like sound, which is inconsistent with the game’s semi-grounded tone.
Firefights are generally boring, although occasionally, there is some unintended entertainment provided by explosions and rag dolls. Due to the dull animations and mild AI, there is very little sense of urgency or danger, and fighting soon gets boring without any melee options or strategic decisions. Instead of feeling like thrilling action scenes, they become boring shooting galleries with hardly moving targets.
There’s no significant XP system or grind-based gameplay loop in MindsEye. You progress linearly through the campaign, unlocking weapons and tools at scripted points. This design emphasizes storytelling over RPG-style progression; such a feature is not an outright flaw, but does limit gameplay variety and player agency. The lack of any meaningful upgrades or development in character within gameplay lends an overall feeling of repetitiveness to the game.
Visually, MindsEye is a mixed bag. At its best—especially during nighttime scenes—the lighting is truly impressive, lending a cinematic quality to the experience. Some areas show a lot of polish, featuring detailed environments and rich object density. However, other locations feel bland and flat, with lifeless interiors and sparse world-building.
Built on Unreal Engine 5, it does show the might of the engine from time to time, yet that potential is considerably diminished by iffy optimization. The world should be alive, yet the world often feels sterile and empty. Several older games like Grand Theft Auto IV have matured in their ability to lend validity to or engage the player; MindsEye still struggles to do so.
Sound design suffers the same fate as the gameplay; it’s inconsistent. While the cutscenes are supported by decent voice acting and musical cues, weapon audio is a huge disappointment. Some guns sound cartoonish like they were pulled from a sci-fi parody rather than a grounded cyberpunk thriller. A pistol might sound more like a toy than a lethal firearm. The audio direction clashes with the serious tone the game tries to maintain, undermining the immersion during combat sequences.
MindsEye had all the ingredients to be something truly special. A senior executive regarded for his experience in the industry, a very ambitious narrative, cutting-edge technology- Unreal Engine 5, and a final product that is bereft of good optimization, uninspiring gameplay, and a dead world. Story and cinematics are bright points, with a narrative that is worth seeing through, especially if you appreciate cyberpunk aesthetics and cinematic-style storytelling.
However, the technical issues are a little too damning to ignore. On PC, the game can barely hold 40 FPS, with significant drops in the frame rate, almost intolerable stuttering, bugs, awful AI, and static environments create a feeling that the whole thing was rushed, which becomes painfully clear that it needed more than a couple of months of development time. The out-of-date and extremely repetitive combat prospect cannot be reconciled with a world that holds nothing interactive or immersive to recommend it at full price.
