Prior to the launch of Build A Rocket Boy’s debut game, MindsEye, co-CEO Mark Gerhard cited a concerted effort to trash the game and went on to blame its poor reception on corporate sabotage, although he didn’t name whom he saw as the guilty party. Now, Gerhard is revisiting those claims of espionage and sabotage while sharing a message about BARB’s latest round of layoffs.
“Over the past months, we have been working with external partners and legal advisors to investigate the criminal activity that took place around our launch,” said Gerhard in a statement posted to LinkedIn. “That work has taken far longer than expected, but it has now resulted in overwhelming evidence of organized espionage and corporate sabotage affecting MindsEye. Because this matter is moving toward prosecution, we cannot share the full details publicly yet.”
Gerhard’s remarks drew rebukes from other figures in the industry.
“It’s got to be some real insult to injury to have your CEO lay you off while blaming conspiracies and corporate espionage after ordering monitoring software to be secretly installed on employee PCs,” wrote Necrosoft Games director Brandon Sheffield.
“Respectfully, the people you’re casting off deserve much better than to have their layoffs announced alongside whatever this conspiracy is,” added Riot Games manager Nic McConnell. “These are people, this is their livelihood and your post is disrespectful to their contributions.”
Gerhard ended his remarks by thanking the laid off team members and pledging to help “connect people with new opportunities.”
GameSpot’s review for MindsEye scored it 3/10, and the game had a very troubled launch. Developers at the studio reportedly worked “around the clock” to fix the game’s numerous issues. It didn’t look good when a pair of senior executives left BARB shortly before the game’s release.
Several developers from the game shared an open letter to Build A Rocket Boy’s leaders that called them out for causing “pain and stress for your employees,” before adding, “Our experience at the company has been one of burnout, job insecurity, health issues, and the failure of a game that many of us have put years of our lives into.”
Build A Rocket Boy co-founder and former Rockstar/GTA boss Leslie Benzies was also recently mentioned in the Epstein files. That’s not proof of illegal activity, but it was another public-relations black eye for the company.