Microsoft’s new gaming CEO Asha Sharma has responded to concerns around her background in AI and lack of previous roles in gaming, as part of her first major interview since yesterday’s announcement that she will replace veteran Xbox boss Phil Spencer.

Last night, IGN exclusively broke the news of a stunning reshuffle at the top of Microsoft’s gaming division. Veteran chief and avid gamer Phil Spencer was retiring, his protégé Sarah Bond was following him out the door, and Sharma was now in charge. Meanwhile, Xbox Studios leader Matt Booty had secured a promotion, and will now serve as Sharma’s right-hand man.

Now, Sharma has spoken with Variety and addressed the two immediate concerns raised by many Xbox fans last night as the news broke — that Microsoft boss Satya Nadella had chosen the company’s CoreAI head of product development to replace Phil Spencer, who previously had no experience running anything to do with video games.

In Sharma’s first message to Microsoft staff, Sharma laid out her three main commitments: “great games”, “the return of Xbox” and “future of play.”

Talking to Variety, Sharma said she believed great games were those with “deep emotional resonance”, “a distinct point of view” and experiences with stories that make players “feel something.” Sharma then gave the beloved narrative mystery Firewatch as an example of this.

On her track record, Sharma admitted she had “a lot to learn” as an outside to the gaming community, but was a “platform builder” who intended to “earn the right to be trusted by players and developers.”

Sharma began her career at Microsoft in marketing, though has spent time at Meta, scaling Facebook Messenger to billions of users, and then retail delivery company Instacart, where she helped guide the business to profitability.

While she has spent two years working on Microsoft’s AI push, her initial message to Xbox staff included a pledge to “not chase short-term efficiency or flood our ecosystem with soulless AI slop.” To Variety, she claimed similar, saying her stance was that she had “no tolerance for bad AI.”

“AI has long been part of gaming and will continue to be,” Sharma said, mentioning the need for gaming “growth engines,” but that “great stories are created by humans.”

Concluding, Sharma teased more news from Xbox would surface next month during the annual GDC conference, before bigger announcements to follow at a new Xbox Games Showcase later this spring.

IGN has much more on this story, including the many farewells from veteran developers to Phil Spencer, and Spencer’s personal words to the Xbox community following his departure.

Image credit: Microsoft

Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social