Seamus Resigns from Microsoft

[Bond]

Seamus Resigns from Microsoft

http://teamxbox.com/news.php?id=2920

Seamus Blackley, the co-creator of Microsoft Corp.'s Xbox video game console and widely seen as the project's father, has resigned from Microsoft, Microsoft and a Blackley spokeswoman said on Monday.

"He has left Microsoft to pursue other opportunities," said James Bernard, an Xbox spokesman at Microsoft . "We value his contributions."

The news comes just days after Microsoft said it would miss its fiscal year-end sales target for the Xbox by as much as 40 percent, a shortfall it blamed on weak sales. Those weak sales led to deep price cut in Europe and Australia last week.

Blackley's spokeswoman said he would not be ready to discuss details of the new venture for another two weeks at least, and she gave no indication as to what type of business the new company will pursue.

Blackley, a physicist by training, worked at the video game arm of Hollywood movie studio DreamWorks before joining Microsoft as head of the company's Advanced Technology Group. He has been one of the Xbox's public faces from the start, even going so far as to propose to his fiance during the Xbox's launch on Nov. 15 in Times Square in New York.

"You can talk about short-term problems now, but everyone's going to have problems," Blackley said. "We built momentum with the developers (in Japan) ... in a year-and-a-half that pays off."

Blackley worked at the video game arm of movie studio DreamWorks before joining Microsoft as head of the company's Advanced Technology Group. Before his stint at DreamWorks, he was also a noted designer of flight simulation games.

He has been one of the Xbox's public faces from the start, even going so far as to propose to his fiance during the Xbox's launch on Nov. 15 in Times Square in New York.

A book being released on Friday about the history of the Xbox project, "Opening the Xbox," by journalist Dean Takahashi, features a forward written by Blackley and centers in large part on the genesis of the project through him.

"This guy was the soul of the Xbox," Takahashi told Reuters. "You have to just wonder, why can't Microsoft hang on to a person like this?"

The book, and Blackley's resignation, come as the video game industry is in the midst of gearing up for the Electronic Entertainment Expo, or E3, which begins on May 21 in Los Angeles.

E3 is the video game industry's most important event of the year, with hardware makers discussing forecasts for the year and game publishers showing off their new titles. A good E3 showing is considered crucial to a company's financial success.

Industry executives, analysts and observers generally believe Microsoft is likely to cut the Xbox's price from $299 to $249 or even $199 at some point this year, though they are divided as to whether such a cut will come at E3 or later in the year, perhaps around September, a more traditional time for price cuts.

As for Blackley's future, he declined to rule out the possibility of developing games for platforms other than the Xbox. "The other platforms are interesting ... the PC in particular," he said.

[Professor S]

I have a sneaking feeling that Seamus was asked to resign, and didn't necessarily come up with the idea himself. Asking corporate heads to resign is a standard practice to help these executives save face when starting a new job.

This is a shame though, because he really was the heart and sould behind the XBox. Hopefully this isn't the harbinger of ill news for the Big Black Box.

[Perfect Stu]

That sucks...

I'm wondering why and how exactly this resignation took place. I mean, Xbox is gonna turn on the burners this E3, and then with games near the end of the year. Which makes me wonder why exactly this happened. Hmmm...

[Xantar]

My guess is actually that Mr. Blackley resigned to pursue other ventures just like it says. More specifically, he's off to make games. In this interview, he says that he wanted to make games and that he has thought of this for a long time. I believe him. He got his start in gaming, after all.