The Blacklisted expansion for MindsEye has officially arrived, promising to finally reveal the "evidence of the sabotage" alleged by Build a Rocket Boy (BARB) co-CEOs Leslie Benzies and Mark Gerhard. I recently sat down to play the MindsEye mission about the alleged game saboteurs, and frankly, it was a massive letdown. While the base game has its moments of accidental fun, this new content is just poorly executed.
A Failed Transition from Agent 47
According to a recent Kotaku interview with former BARB lead animator Chris Wilson, Blacklisted was originally intended to be a Hitman crossover featuring Agent 47. However, that deal with IO Interactive ended in March, forcing BARB to repurpose the content.
Instead of the legendary assassin, players now control Julia Black, an elite freelance killer working for an agency called Meridian. Your task is to take out a notorious drug dealer and an arms dealer, but the substance just isn't there.
Gameplay Flaws and Low-Effort Presentation
The mission is incredibly brief; you can finish it in well under an hour if you don't get distracted. Unfortunately, the technical execution and presentation feel remarkably cheap:
- Lack of saving: If you exit the game, your checkpoints will not save for a future session.
- Budget trailers: The cinematic trailer famously used royalty-free music, as discovered by Polygon.
- Broken AI logic: Police appear in fixed locations in Redrock City despite being absent during high-speed car chases involving hijacked limousines.
The entire experience feels like "low-effort trash" across the board, from the dialogue to the setting. There is nothing in the gameplay that manages to be accidentally interesting.
Searching for Truth in the MindsEye mission about the alleged game saboteurs
The most frustrating part of this expansion is its failure to provide any actual "evidence" regarding the studio's claims. At one point, I pursued a masked DJ who served as a potential reference to Cyber Boi, the YouTuber who faced backlash after mentioning Benzies' name in the Epstein files.
While Wilson noted that BARB leadership believed Cyber Boi was behind the sabotage—citing "hate mail" shared by Benzies—the mission offers nothing substantial. Wilson remarked, "These emails read like League of Legends chats... In no way did it seem like a sophisticated multi-million dollar plan to try and take down Build a Rocket Boy."
The mission ends with a predictable death for the DJ and a vague mention of a "ritual network" within Meridian, but that's all. Even if you are following the drama closely, the single, throwaway mention is easy to miss.
Final Verdict on Blacklisted
The wider conspiracy involving stolen data from Meridian feels empty and toothless. As Julia Black, you are given almost no context regarding the mission's objectives or the nature of the stolen information. The only guidance comes from a robotic handler providing pointless exposition.
Ultimately, this MindsEye mission about the alleged game saboteurs makes the original claims of sabotage look even more dubious. It doesn't provide answers; it just proves that MindsEye is a fundamentally flawed title. While the expansion is free for existing owners, your time is likely better spent elsewhere.
