In 2014, following the release of BioShock Infinite, Levine opted to significantly restructure the studio from around 90 to 15 employees and focus more on narrative games.

In February 2017, the studio announced that it had been rebranded as Ghost Story Games and considered a fresh start from the original Irrational name, though still operating at the same business subsidiary under Take-Two.

Looking Glass founder Paul Neurath agreed to give them a small budget, an office within their studio, and gave them the opportunity to work on a sequel to System Shock.

[4] During development of The Lost, Irrational started a second project with Crave, the turn-based superhero-theme Freedom Force.

Crave's monetary issues led the game to be published in 2002 by the EA Partners label of Electronic Arts.

[4] Shortly after the cancellation of The Lost, Vivendi Games tapped Irrational to develop a single-player campaign based on the Tribes series, which had traditionally been multiplayer shooters in the past, and posed a challenge to craft a narrative around.

This led to some difficulties with Vivendi, as at one point Levine was fired from the narrative position, replaced by two writers from Hollywood, only to be later rehired to complete the story.

[7][8] Irrational had difficulties selling this concept to publishers, as the concept of immersive sims like System Shock 2 was not considered profitable, but the company persisted and refined their ideas as word of a new immersive sim from Irrational began to spread in video game news coverage.

[14] By 2008, when Irrational's contract with Take-Two was under review, Levine had lost interest in the XCOM project, and instead negotiated to develop a new BioShock game.

Levine said that he wanted to start "a smaller, more entrepreneurial endeavor at Take-Two," speaking to how much stress completing a large game like BioShock: Infinite had caused him.

[18] Levine said, "I need to refocus my energy on a smaller team with a flatter structure and a more direct relationship with gamers.

"[18] Levine had considered starting a new development studio for this, knowing that building the ideas would take several years before any game product would be made.