MindsEye director talks comparisons and GTA 6’s massive scale

MindsEye has certainly captured my attention.

The upcoming action-adventure title comes from Leslie Benzies’ Build a Rocket Boy studio, and if that name feels very familiar, it’s for a valid reason.

Leslie spent much of his career at Rockstar North where he served as the studio’s president.

He was the lead dev on some of the company’s biggest titles, including the likes of Grand Theft Auto V, GTA Online, and Red Dead Redemption.

As such, you can understand why many are so enraptured to see what this auteur cooks up now that he’s stepped away from the Rockstar Games banner.

MindsEye centres around Jacob Diaz, played by Alex Hernandez, a former soldier with a neural implant which is the MindsEye the title refers to.

Diaz suffers from memory loss, and decides to head to the city of Redrock where he believes he can regain his memories by discovering the secrets behind the implant.

It’s a third-person action-adventure game, with the trailers reflecting somewhat of a GTA meets Cyberpunk 2077 feel.

Of course though, MindsEye is very much its own thing.

You can take a look at the game in action below.

MindsEye will tie in with Build a Rocket Boy’s fellow release Everywhere, somewhat of a MMO where players can create content.

Content created in Everywhere will be able to be added to MindsEye so while there is a linear fixed story, the game’s world will also be supported by user-generated content.

It’s an incredibly interesting premise, and I just so happened to get the chance to ask Leslie about it at the recent BAFTA Games Awards.

The developer had just come off stage from presenting the evening’s top honour ‘Best Game’, and granted us a few minutes of his time.

“Our latest trailer came out a week or so ago,” Leslie told me. “But we’ll have continuous trailers.”

“One of the things we're most excited about is the Arcadia trailer. And so within MindsEye and the PC, there's a tool that's gonna let players build AAA-quality games, so that'll be our next trailer for us; that'll be out in the next few weeks.”

Whilst it’s incredibly different to GTA, MindsEye will naturally draw comparisons due to Leslie’s previous works.

I was keen to find out whether it’s difficult to escape those comparisons when embarking on the creation of a new IP.

“There's always comparisons. The first question that gets asked is always about the old game, but I think that’s human nature,” Leslie said.

“You know, it’s what happened to Dave Grohl and the Foo Fighters, [people] were more interested in Nirvana. It’ll take a bit of time for us to find our own identity.”

And if you’re wondering if Leslie is still excited to see what’s being cooked up with GTA VI, the first GTA release since his departure: “Absolutely. [There’s a] great amount of geniuses there always creating something new, unique and of a scale that very few others can actually pull off.”

MindsEye is due to launch on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox series X/S on 10 June this year.