Just a week before the debut of this year’s E3, Microsoft announced that the new General Manager for the Games for Windows Live program at Redmond is Chris Early.

Early has been the mastermind behind the massive success registered by MSN Games and Xbox Live Arcade and also the studio manager for. His new position will be effective starting July 9, while his replacement for the Microsoft Casual Games studio manager will be Bryan Trussel.

In addition to expanding Microsoft’s casual gaming audience and game experiences across multiple platforms, Early has been a passionate advocate and driver of Games for Windows Live and the cross-platform gaming vision.

Prior to his nomination at Microsoft, Early headed GameSpy Industries as the chief operating officer and president, and before that he was executive vice president of Mplayer.

“Early’s team will continue to bridge the gap between Xbox LIVE and Windows, add features and services appropriate to PC gamers, and help developers integrate Games for Windows – LIVE into their games. He will be bringing his extensive experience in PC gaming to the team and will drive the product roadmap for Games for Windows – LIVE.”

After joining Microsoft as studio manager for Microsoft Casual Games in March 2005, Chris Early stepped into the role of Microsoft’s product unit manager for Xbox Live Arcade and Microsoft Casual Games in February, following the departure of Greg Canessa to PopCap Games.

About his work at Games for Windows, Early told Gamasutra that: "If you look at the amount of users it gets, and the amount of downloads for the service – that’s a real indication to us that people are involved and engaged with what’s going on. They may not buy a particular game, but we have less control over that from the standpoint that we make very few of those games.

But I think it’s successful if we’ve driven someone to be motivated to download, and so far we’ve had more than 25 million downloads of games across Xbox Live Arcade since launch."