Not very many gamers remember Don Mattrick's time as Xbox head honcho fondly. He was the guy that took the stage to tell us about how Xbox One would be more of an entertainment all-in-one than a gaming device. He tried to sell us that janky Kinect, and then told fans they could keep playing the Xbox 360 if they just wanted something to game on. You could argue Xbox is still reeling from the Mattrick days today, but back in the early 2010s, he had a strong hold on the green team.
It was a bold new era for gaming in those days, and Mattrick thought it was all about making money quick. Speaking in a thread on Bluesky, former Halo 4 quest designer and Marathon developer Dan Callan recalled a time he demoed Halo 4 for Mattrick, where the executive made quite a controversial suggestion.
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Mattrick reportedly asked if anyone had played Diablo III when the demo session ended. "He then went on to suggest we should copy their idea of a real money auction house for campaign mech skins. And every single human being around him reacted like this was an amazing groundbreaking idea while simultaneously realizing this was the stupidest shit imaginable since everyone with a brain had seen how hard that blew up in their face," Callan recalled.
Diablo III's auction house did not go down well, as anyone who was around when the game released will remember. That didn't dissuade Mattrick, and led Callan to believe "game execs remain stupid detached money grubbing idiots."
Xbox now moves into a new age, thanks to CEO Asha Sharma hitting the big reset button. We'll have to see if that means a new approach to revenue, and if it'll emulate Mattrick's old wishes.