Minecraft chief Matt Booty taking charge of Xbox game dev and publishing

Minecraft team leader Matt Booty has been named as the new head of Microsoft Studios, and will fill the gap left by the recently promoted Phil Spencer. 

As reported by GamesBeat, Booty will now oversee the overall development and publishing strategy at Microsoft, making the company more agile in the ever-fluctuating world of games. 

It means that Spencer, who was promoted to executive vice president of Microsoft last August, will be in charge of the overall grand strategy for games, and that Booty will be tasked with executing those strategies. 

The change in hierarchy will see Booty report to Spencer, with the rest of the studio chiefs reporting to Booty.

"I wanted to make sure we had the right organization in place to deliver on our content goals," explained Spencer," speaking to GamesBeat.

"With that, I made the decision that I wanted to anoint a leader of our Microsoft Studios organization, which if you’ve tracked it, I’ve had the leaders of our individual franchises reporting to me for the last three and a half years." 

As the console maker prepares to invest in even more game content, Spencer says it's imperative the company creates a "unified studios leadership organization."

"[That's] going to be critical to our long-term success, so I’ve asked Matt Booty to step up into the role of leading Microsoft Studios."

Booty joined Microsoft in 2010 after spending a decade at Mortal Kombat and Spy Hunter developer Midway Games. 

During his time at Microsoft, he served as GM of the company's Redmond game studios, before moving to take charge of the global teams responsible for developing the Minecraft franchise. 

"It’s been an honor to lead the Minecraft franchise," wrote Booty on Twitter, "and I’m incredibly excited to support our first party game teams in my new role."