Intro: All GTA Clones Are Not Alike
In the modern age, GTA clones seem a dime a dozen. Some have succeeded in cashing in on the fad of a lawless, open world sandbox while others have more or less died in the cradle. As someone who has been playing the Grand Theft Auto series since GTA III on the PS2, at an age when I definitely should not have been, it’s safe to say that I have seen my fair share of clones.
This isn’t to say that there haven’t been more then a few enjoyable one in the time since then. The first ones that come to mind are the playful Saints Row, the somewhat revolutionary tech focused Watch Dogs, and even the Scarface game on the PS2 managed to both add something new to the formula, while also retaining what makes this genre of games so entertaining. But what makes GTA unique? What is the formula Rockstar has perfected as we head into GTA VI? Well most would say it’s the open world, or the ability to do whatever you want without anyone to tell you if it’s right or wrong. Enter MindsEye a game that well, aspires to be great but falters in more areas then one. Let’s just get right into it. Just be warned – it’s a doozy.
Story: An Interesting Concept Done in the Worst Way
Now I will go out and say that the story kept me entertained throughout my entire ten hour playthrough. You play as Jacob Diaz, a former special operation soldier who is haunted by flashbacks of a mission that changed his life for the worst and all but erased his memories from that night. You see when Jacob went on this special operation mission before the events of the game, he was the host of a piece of experimental technology known as the MindsEye. During the events of this mission, this piece of tech becomes unstable after they discover an otherworldly ruins filled with the technology of something beyond human understanding.
When Jacob and his MindsEye technology interacted with this alien tech, it changed his neurological pathways in a way that almost made it seem like that day never happened at all. Through a short cutscene at the beginning of the game, you discover that Jacob was not only affected by this as far as the inner workings of his mind, but this alien technology also caused his own robotic companion to kill most of his special operations team. Looking to start over and find out what happened on that night, Jacob makes his way to the fictional city of Redrock (a city very clearly modeled after Las Vegas) and your story starts.
The start of your journey has Jacob reconnecting with an old friend from college as he attempts to get a job working for the same company that created the titular technology still implanted in his head. What follows from this point is a ten to twelve hour slog as Jacob gets sucked into corporate espionage, assassinations, alien invasions and a host of other random events and missions that all push Jacob towards the answers he’s looking for. Along the way you meet a ton of forgettable characters who feel like they are ripped straight from a generic action movie. You have the token snobby tech billionaire who treats you like one of his corporate lackeys, the eccentric tattooed hacker that your character randomly falls in love with, and as many shady ex-military bad guys as you could ever ask for with the most basic of plans for world domination.
This isn’t to say that there aren’t some genuinely good moments hidden between these random missions, but I have to admit I felt like I was playing through an early 2000’s bargain bin GTA clone for at least half the story. When stuff does finally start to kick up towards the last act of the game, it really feels like you’re going to get a decent payoff until the final cutscene; which ends in one of the most confusing cliffhangers I have witnessed in recent memory. Not only does it end on what amounts to a black screen, but it feels heavily implied that we won’t be getting any payoff until a 2nd game releases, or a DLC. With how much of a mess MindsEye’s launch is turning out to be, I doubt we’ll get either.
World: A Uneventful, Buggy Copy of Las Vegas
So I imagine most of you reading this review are probably thinking “Hey this guy didn’t talk about the open world. That’s the best part of a GTA like game.” Now hold up. Don’t pull out your pitchforks yet cause I am about to ruin your day. The world of Redrock is as uneventful as they come. Not only are you locked into a linear experience with no way to explore past the limits of whatever mission you’re doing at that moment, but the actual free roam option is entirely removed until you unlock it about halfway through the campaign. And this isn’t just like “Hey you unlocked the free roam have fun being able to explore!” no. You as the player have to go into your start menu and select an entirely different instance. Only then are you able to actually explore the city. And the worst part is, there isn’t even anything in the city worth exploring.
Citizens mostly run around and react as badly as you can imagine from an early 2000’s game. You can’t steal any car, or really drive in any vehicles unless they are “yours,” and the only thing you can find in terms of side quests are these fragment portals scattered around the city that have you reliving certain memories connected to the MindsEye. That is literally it. I will admit driving is pretty decent and handles very similar to GTA IV’s system, but there is really nothing to do besides racing side missions and you guessed it – they are also hidden in the Missions screens in your menu. I mean overall, I don’t think I could have come up with a more disappointing world if I tried. The potential is there to add user created content, but half the player base isn’t going to make it that far anyways with how badly the game runs.
Now the performance is really what is going to kill it for most people. I am not even going to waste that much time on it as you really only need to know a few things; the game is somehow locked to 30 FPS no matter what console you’re on. It doesn’t matter if you have the beefiest computer in existence or a PS5 Pro – the game is hard locked to 30 FPS. In 2025. Thirty frames per second in the age of standardized 144Hz monitors and 60 FPS on even the worst GPUs. Really makes you wonder what happened. Pair this with the fact that screen tears; stuttering to the point where you’re getting less than fifteen frames per second is common in gun fights; and pop ins will be occurring every second as you traverse the world, and I can’t say anyone is going to be enjoying their time in Redrock.
Gameplay: Barebones In Nearly Every Way
The gameplay isn’t awful by any means, but it is as barebones as I could have ever imagined. First off, there is glaring lack of basic gameplay aspects that I thought would be present in a game of this genre. Things such as the option to shoot out of your car, (unless it’s one of the many on the rails sections) and even the ability to melee seem completely absent. The gunplay itself is very basic and most gunfights are dumbed down to mowing down dozens, if not hundreds of enemies that all look and act the same. This leads to your first mission’s gunfight feeling more or less the same as your final mission’s. There is barely any enemy variety past the usual robots and soldiers you’ve seen a hundred times. There is a new type of enemy that appears in the later stage of the game, but these newer enhanced robots function the same as the base one but with the added bonus of having about double the health and three times the aim. The gunplay isn’t going to blow your socks off, but it’s so bare that again, it almost felt like I was playing a game from the early 2000’s, not one made in the past five years.
Pair this with the fact that the only real weapons you have at your disposal are the very uninventive variety of guns. From the standard assault rifles, pistols and shotguns, you really do have a game that didn’t seem too intent on changing anything but the basic formula. Most gunfights can be described as a simple three step process that extends from the first mission all the way to the last. Enter cover, let the braindead AI come to you or pop their heads up, and shoot them in the face. And that is pretty much it. Like I said there is barely any enemy variety and the gunfights you get into are more or less a battle of attrition with the only thing running out being your patience.
There is a small robot companion you get the second half of the game that spices up your fights, but by the time you unlock his last skill the story only has about 2 or 3 hours left in the tank. He lets you stun other robots, hack them so that they will fight for you, and toss a special type of grenade intro groups of human and robot enemies alike to cause a little bit of mayhem. Other than that he functions as a recon drone whose main use is corporate espionage and well, spying on those unfortunate enough to stand between you and the secrets of the past. Overall there’s nothing that makes this title’s gameplay loop stand out, and I can almost guarantee that you’ll be racing towards the end wondering where it all went wrong.
Ending Thoughts: Save Yourself the Trouble
Mindseye is a game that falters on nearly every level. It’s story is an interesting enough concept, but it seems to be in such a rush to get to the finish line that any semblance of character development or emotional attachment is completely brushed over without a thought. Pair the average story with the fact that the game runs awful on even the beefiest of rigs, has the most barebones gameplay loop in recent memory, and clocks in at a meager ten hours to complete and you have what amounts to a half-baked experience that should be avoided at all costs.
MindsEye was reviewed on PlayStation 5 and released for PC, Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5 on the 10th of June 2025.
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