Microsoft names former head of Rare Studios Craig Duncan as the new lead of Xbox Game Studios following the retirement of 30-year veteran Alan Hartman.
While the move to replace Hartman comes as an inevitability following a well-deserved retirement, replacing your second head of Xbox Game Studios in under three years seems to only add to the growing concern that Microsoft’s gaming division has become rudderless since the big Activision acquisition.
Before I pontificate, let’s get to what actually happened today over at the Xbox Game Studios.
According to an email obtained by The Verge, former head of Xbox Studio Matt Booty issued an email detailing the transition from Hartman to Duncan. After highlighting Hartman’s historic participation in the gaming industry, Booty gets to the point:
When seeking our next leader to navigate the complexities of our business and foster the creativity needed for our games to thrive, we collaborated with HR to evaluate both external and internal candidates, considering the unique demands of the XGS role.
Matt Booty – president of Xbox game content
I am pleased to announce that Craig Duncan will assume the role of Head of Xbox Game Studios. Craig brings a wealth of experience from his tenure at Codemasters, Midway Games, and Sumo Digital before joining Xbox in 2011 to lead Rare. During this time, Rare has achieved sustained business success and developed new IP, most notably the ever-evolving Sea of Thieves, a cross-platform franchise with over 40 million players.
In his new role, Craig will continue to focus on helping our studios deliver high-quality, differentiated game experiences that can grow into successful franchises and reach more players by investing in new IP. Craig will report to me and join the Game Content and Studios leadership team, working closely with Alan during the transition. The existing XGS leadership team Alan established will remain intact and report to Craig.
With Duncan moving over to his new role as head of Xbox Game Studios, his former seat will be filled by co-leads Joe Neate and Jim Horth will oversee the continued growth of the studio’s current flagship title Sea of Thieves, pun intended.
However, back to the shuffling of deck chairs at the head of the Xbox Game Studio position, feels like another reactionary move from the Xbox team. When Head of Xbox Phil Spencer took over the sinking ship Don Mattrick left, his vision was the antithesis of his predecessor. Spencer preached ‘gaming anywhere’ and that sermon garnered a lot of goodwill with the gaming community as the division began delivering toward that proclamation. Getting rid of previous DRM concepts, delivering backward compatibility, paring down the ambitious OS concepts and delivering a competitive next-gen console helped make up a lot of ground lost by the Xbox One’s team.
Fast forward seven years and Microsoft went on a studio buying spree, won the top game publisher title at a $68B tab, and controls one of the best received franchises in gaming history. Unfortunately, the Xbox team is simultaneously raising prices on the one vehicle that facilitates is promise of ‘gaming anywhere’, seemingly abandoned its cloud gaming development, has almost zero to show for its studio spending spree, and has yet to deliver updated vision for the platform or its business.
Add to all that, Microsoft’s gaming division is struggling to keep a head of Xbox Game Studio long enough to establish a leadership role or an internal vision for its developers, partners, and employees.
Throwing money at a problem without a plan or vision is how Microsoft got itself into its Windows Phone debacle, and we all know how that story ended.
