Beyond coming from a background at Microsoft Studios -- the name for a group of internal game-development groups at Microsoft -- Spencer's known for being game-focused. He reaffirmed this approach to us. "Winning with the gamer first is gonna be something that drives the organization," Spencer said. That's at the heart of his boss Nadella's Xbox reorganization.

With Spencer's title change comes a heap of new responsibility (due to an internal reorg). He's not just overseeing the Xbox One and Xbox 360, but also the entire ecosystem around the greater Xbox brand. That includes the following departments: Xbox, Xbox Live, Xbox Music, Xbox Video and Microsoft Studios.

Spencer actually fought for all this oversight. In a discussion with Nadella, as well as Windows boss Terry Myerson and devices lead (former Nokia head) Stephen Elop, he had two stipulations. The first was the unification of Xbox under one umbrella; the second was a seat at the table with the likes of Myerson and Elop. "The Xbox team, the Xbox leader (me) sitting at the same leadership table as Terry (the Windows team leader, the Windows Phone OS team leader) really helps us look at gaming as that first-class citizen across all Microsoft platforms," he said.

More tightly, intelligently integrated Xbox services across more Windows platforms is something Redmond's struggled with for years. With Spencer, there's hope that someone with a real sense of the game industry can bridge the longstanding divide.

The next major beat for Spencer's Xbox will, naturally, be E3. He said we'll hear dribs and drabs before then -- some games will get launch dates; the first ID@Xbox games will arrive on the Xbox One -- but expect Xbox to once again lean on the all-important holiday sales season for its major game releases.