Build A Rocket Boy, the studio founded in 2016 by Rockstar veteran Leslie Benzies, has appointed Opus Advisory Group as administrator after accumulating £61.8 million in outstanding creditor debt, the company confirmed to GamesIndustry.biz.

A Companies House filing indicates the MindsEye developer is insolvent, formalising months of operational distress that followed the June 2025 launch of its debut title. The appointment triggers statutory protection from creditors while administrators assess the studio's assets and map a route to continuation, sale or liquidation.

How deep is the financial damage?

The most recent audited accounts, covering the 12 months to September 30, 2025, show a £47.5 million operating loss and a £36.2 million net loss. The £61.8 million creditor balance disclosed in those accounts indicates the studio could not service obligations accrued during MindsEye's protracted development and the retrenchment that followed its launch.

Build A Rocket Boy raised capital from NetEase Games, RedBird Capital Partners and Galaxy Interactive. The company confirmed that directors representing all three investors departed the board during summer 2026. That sequence points to a breakdown between management and backers as cash reserves eroded, roughly seven months after MindsEye shipped.

What went wrong after launch?

MindsEye launched on June 4, 2025 to negative reviews and a poor audience reception. Within roughly four weeks, approximately 300 staff received redundancy notices. The IWGB Game Workers union filed legal action against the studio in October 2025, alleging the redundancy process had been mishandled.

Two further waves of layoffs followed, the most recent in September 2026. Between those reductions, employees in early 2026 discovered Teramind monitoring software running on company machines without prior management notification. The IWGB opened a second legal claim over the deployment, citing data privacy violations.

Co-CEO Leslie Benzies characterised the surveillance as a countermeasure against an alleged sabotage effort. Fellow co-CEO Mark Gerhard escalated the claim later, telling outlets without evidence that "a very big American company" had spent north of €1 million in 2025 "committing criminal activity" against Build A Rocket Boy. The studio repeated the allegation of "organised espionage and corporate sabotage" in March 2026 alongside another round of redundancies.

In April 2026, the studio shipped the Blacklisted update. Co-CEO Mark Gerhard described it as "a big step forward for MindsEye, and our studio" at the time, but the patch failed to shift audience sentiment.

What does administration mean for staff and creditors?

An administrator's role is to maximise recoveries for creditors, typically by trading the business while seeking a buyer, closing unprofitable operations, or moving the company into a liquidation sale. Administrators must publish a statement of proposals within eight weeks of appointment. Prior redundancies have already cut the operational headcount available to any hypothetical buyer well below the pre-launch roster.

A former Build A Rocket Boy staffer told GamesIndustry.biz shortly after MindsEye's launch that survival looked unlikely: "I don't think BARB survives this crisis. I believe the end is coming for BARB, and it's not heralded by saboteurs, but by Mark and Leslie themselves."

What happens next?

Opus Advisory Group now controls the timetable. The administrators will evaluate whether to seek a sale of the business and its MindsEye intellectual property, shut the studio entirely, or pursue a company voluntary arrangement. The watchpoint for the wider UK games industry: whether a buyer emerges willing to take on the MindsEye operation, and at what valuation the £61.8 million creditor claim ultimately settles.