Yesterday, Xbox CEO Asha Sharma announced two new high-profile hires: Scott Van Vliet, a former OpenAI executive, as the new Chief Technology Officer, and Matthew Ball as the new Chief Strategy Officer. Now, in a brief statement shared with Bloomberg, Ball revealed that his focus will be on resurrecting Microsoft's so-called storied franchises and rebuilding Xbox's console business. Despite the well-known issues with component costs, Ball reckons the console business is still growing, and Sharma's new strategy (which he advised on) should drive revenue and profit.
Needless to say, Ball's suggestion that some Xbox IPs will be revived has already sent fans into a frenzy of speculation. There's a bunch of options on the table: Banjo-Kazooie, Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, Crimson Skies, MechAssault, Viva Piñata, Kameo, and Shadowrun. Some of these franchises have been dormant for well over a decade, and Xbox gamers have been clamoring for their return. Granted, neither of these is likely to set the industry on fire, but bringing them back would at least help with goodwill.
For those who don't know much about him, Matthew Ball is one of the most respected gaming analysts in the industry, known for his annual State of Video Gaming report and for steering Epyllion, the advisory and venture firm he founded. He has spent years arguing that the games business is growing more unevenly than the headlines would suggest, with record revenue coexisting with weaker funding, tougher margins, and a heavier reliance on a relatively small number of hit franchises. That is arguably why he is now counseling Microsoft to draw from its portfolio of dormant IPs.
Ball's February 2026 report on gaming paints a complex picture:
- The market is still growing, but not evenly. Ball says 2025 global content spending hit a record, yet the money available to typical Western publishers barely grew, or even shrank in real terms, depending on the segment.
- Platform services matter more than raw console software. He argues that console growth has increasingly flowed into subscriptions rather than game sales, which matters for Xbox because Game Pass sits at the heart of that shift.
- Old franchises still dominate attention. His report repeatedly shows that a few legacy hits and big ecosystems capture most of the playtime and spend. By reviving some old franchises, Microsoft could give itself a better chance of getting one of those massive hits.
Interestingly, Ball was previously consulted by Microsoft in 2020 about the Game Pass subscription service. The analyst wrote a lengthy white paper to discuss the pros and cons of subscription models. Given Microsoft's struggles to grow Game Pass and the frequent changes to its strategy, culminating in the massive price increase that was partly reduced just recently, one could imagine they didn't heed Ball's advice too closely.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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