Gearbox writer Mikey Neumann, facing health issues, leaves studio

Mikey Neumann, one of the more visible writers in the games industry, is leaving his position at Gearbox Software to focus on his health and his YouTube show, Movies with Mikey.

Neumann rose to prominence for writing games in the Brothers in Arms and Borderlands series, among others. (He was most recently announced as the writer on Borderlands 3.) But fans came to know him best for being an outgoing public face of Gearbox, where he served as chief creative champion.

In recent years, Neumann has also run a popular webseries where he reviews myriad films. He’s also lived with multiple sclerosis for several years. After suffering a stroke while at the Gearbox offices in 2011, he returned to work, but complications with the disease led him to again take time off as recently as this spring.

His health concerns have become too great, he said on Twitter, to be able to focus on his work at Gearbox.

“I’ve been living with multiple sclerosis for just over five years,” Neumann wrote in a Medium post in May. “That’s how long it’s really been affecting me. Even before this trip to the hospital, I knew MS was slowly eating me alive, and by proxy, my apparently-scrumptious nervous system. I poured myself more into work and my Youtube show. Anything to keep my mind off how bad it was before I knew what bad even was.”

Neumann instead will turn to Movies with Mikey full-time, he said. He recently launched a Patreon to support the series, which is part of the Chainsawsuit channel on YouTube.

“Everything is 1,000,000 % amicable with Gearbox,” Neumann wrote in a tweet. “I physically just can’t do the work anymore. I am, and will always be, part of that family.”

We’ve reached out to Gearbox for comment on Neumann’s departure and will update accordingly.