Rare boss Craig Duncan is taking over from Alan Hartman as the head of Xbox Game Studios.
GI.biz reports that Hartman is retiring from Microsoft in November, just 12 months after he took on the position initially. Duncan joined Rare in 2011 as studio head having previously worked at the likes of Sumo Digital and Midway.
In his new position, he will be overseeing all of Microsoft’s first-party stable, which is to say everything that isn’t under Activision Blizzard and Bethesda. He will be reporting to the president of Xbox game content and studios, Matt Booty.
Exec producer Joe Neate and studio director Jim Horth are replacing Duncan has Rare’s head honchos.
Hartman is best known as the founder of Forza maker Turn 10. In 2021, he was promoted to Microsoft CVP for the Forza and Fable franchises.
“Alan’s career has been marked by innovation, dedication, and an unwavering passion for gaming,” Booty told staff in an email.
“Starting as a contractor at Microsoft in the fledgling CD-ROM group in 1988, Alan has worked on a variety of projects in his time here, from Age of Empires, to Brute Force as the studio head of Digital Anvil, to the founding of Turn 10. Over the years, Alan, Turn 10 and Playground Games delivered 13 Forza Motorsport and Forza Horizon games, building Forza into one of the top racing franchises in the world and regularly pushing the capabilities of our hardware. His work to advance accessibility in gaming has set a benchmark for the industry and under his leadership, Xbox Game Studios has shipped multiple critically acclaimed titles this year and set the stage for highly anticipated games like Avowed, South of Midnight, Fable, and more.”
