The new CEO of Xbox has been responding to questions about her favourite games and where she stands on exclusives, but do video game executives need to be gamers?
Xbox’s massive leadership shake-up over the weekend has raised many questions over the brand’s future, but one of the biggest issues surrounds the history of new CEO Asha Sharma.
Sharma served as the president of Microsoft’s CoreAI product for two years, prior to her new role as CEO of Microsoft Gaming. Her associations with AI naturally raised alarm bells, but an introductory post outlining her vision for Xbox stated she would not ‘chase short-term efficiency or flood our ecosystem with soulless AI slop’.
It’s a smart way to assuage initial concerns, but Sharma’s interactions with Xbox fans on X aren’t quite as convincing.
When one fan highlighted the importance of exclusive games for Xbox’s success – a strategy Microsoft has shifted away from this generation – Sharma replied: ‘Hear you.’ Similarly, she responded ‘I’m listening!’ after being asked to ‘REALLY listen’ to the Xbox community.
While these vague posts don’t necessarily mean Microsoft will suddenly abandon its multiplatform shift (or listen to the qualms of very-online Xbox fans), it’s notable that Sharma would respond to a question about exclusive titles specifically – especially so soon after taking over the role of CEO.
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Sharma has also tried to diffuse concerns around her familiarity with the games industry – and video games generally. When asked about her top three greatest games ever, she replied: ‘For me it’s Halo, Valheim, GoldenEye.’
The choice of Goldeneye 007, which was originally released on the Nintendo 64 in 1997 but hasn’t aged well, suggests Sharma has been exposed to games throughout her life. However, based on other comments and her shared gamertag, it might not be a regular hobby.
Microsoft Gaming’s former CEO, Phil Spencer, was an avid gamer, but a deep dive into Sharma’s gamertag, AMRAHSAHSA, shows she unlocked her first achievement in Halo: The Master Chief Collection on January 15 this year.
She’s also played the likes of Halo Infinite, Cities: Skylines – Remastered, Minecraft, Hogwarts Legacy, Forza Horizon 5 since then, along with indie darlings like Firewatch, Ball X Pit, and What Remains Of Edith Finch.
In response to her gamertag, one person asked if she’d just started ‘touching’ games, to which Sharma replied, ‘I am no @XboxP3,’ aka Phil Spencer. However, she has apparently played Chrono Trigger, which was originally released in 1995 and while not well known by casual gamers is widely acclaimed by fans of the genre.
However, the tweet about playing Chrono Trigger led to accusations that her X account was being run by AI, to which she jokingly replied: ‘Beep Boop Beep Boop.’
Sharma’s gaming history might be all over the place – and it does seem likely that her gamertag got an artificial boost earlier this year – but the belief that you have to be a prolific gamer in order to run a video game company is not borne out by the facts.
Take-Two Interactive’s CEO, Strauss Zelnick, is a great counterpoint to this view. He’s led the company since 2007 and has a lot of success under his belt, yet he’s publicly said how he isn’t a gamer. ‘My role is to attract, retain, and motivate the best talent in the business, and then getting out of their way,’ he told CNBC last year.
Neither of Nintendo’s last two presidents had any background in game design and, perhaps most tellingly, Phil Spencer is a keen gamer and yet his time at Xbox has not exactly been an unbroken run of success.
Sharma’s attempts to try and prove she is familiar with games, whether truthful or otherwise, feels like an unnecessary move to appease Xbox diehards.
Fundamentally, it doesn’t matter whether she’s Onyx rank in Halo Infinite, or beat all the endings in Chrono Trigger, as long as she can effectively lead a company. In fact, after Phil Spencer’s tenure, seeking out someone with the opposite background might well be a good idea.
Based on the new setup, Xbox’s future may be less dependent on one person and more on the dynamic between Sharma and Matt Booty, who has been promoted to chief content officer at Microsoft Gaming. We’ll probably have to wait to the next generation, however, to see how it all shakes out.
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