Dan Callan, a former Halo 4 mission designer, shared an anecdote on Bluesky about Don Mattrick proposing a real-money auction house for the game. The idea came during a demo of the Mantis mech and drew comparisons to Diablo 3's unpopular system.
Callan recalled demoing a mission for Mattrick, then head of Xbox, when the executive asked if anyone had played Diablo 3. Mattrick suggested adding a real-money auction house for campaign mech skins.
The team responded outwardly as if it was a groundbreaking idea. Internally they knew it was poor because Diablo 3's auction house had already failed publicly and Halo 4 was 90 percent complete.
Halo 4 launched in 2012 without the feature. Mattrick left Microsoft in 2013.
The story emerged amid recent Xbox layoffs that affected thousands of workers and multiple studios.