Murayama most recently served as senior vice president and Chief Operating Officer at Squaresoft Inc., a unit of Square, which has since merged with another firm to become Square Enix Co. (J.SQX or 9684). In that position, he helped make the company Squaresoft one of the most popular game development firms in the U.S.
Murayama's link with Square Enix may serve well for Microsoft.
"It is obviously desirable if we have software titles from Square Enix for our Xbox platform," Murayama said. Square Enix is the developer of popular online role-playing games including "Final Fantasy XI."
Microsoft also said Thursday that Sony's PlayStation 2 is its "clear competitor," rather than Nintendo Co.'s (J.NTD or 7974) GameCube console. The price of the GameCube has been slashed to $99 from $149 ahead of the winter holiday season, some $80 below competing consoles such as Xbox and PlayStation 2.
"From day one, we've been selling Xbox at a price premium to GameCube and I don't think that's going to change," said Robbie Bach, Microsoft's chief Xbox officer, after a briefing in Tokyo.
Earlier this year, Microsoft slashed the price of Xbox console to $179 from $ 199, while Sony began packaging an Internet connector with its consoles.
Bach said that "it's reasonable to think" that the video game industry will double in size in the next ten years if games attract broader audience as a tool for entertainment.
Video games, which appealed to a "relatively small segment of consumers" years ago, has a 40% global penetration rate today, he added.
Bach said Microsoft isn't interested in acquiring any stakes in games publishers, in a response to a question that the software giant may still be eyeing Japan's Sega Corp.