Alistair Willis, of Gamasutra, put Chris Early on the hot seat and came out with a massive seven page interview. In it, Chris (recently replacing Greg Canessa as Product Unit Manager for Xbox Live Arcade and Microsoft Casual Games) discusses XBLA's successes and struggles. And also sticks in a minor jab at the competition.

"There’ll be people that develop on other platforms that are good enough to make it to Xbox Live Arcade as well."

Ooo...BURN! You're the Burn Master, Chris Early!

If you don't feel like wading through the whole article, more highlights after the break.

[via Gamasutra, thanks Measure.]

"...so far we’ve had more than 25 million downloads of games across Xbox Live Arcade since launch."

"...we’re finding out that there is a lot of secondary users – moms, girlfriends, people like that."

"One of my personal [favorite additions to XBLA] is the way that Achievements are displayed for Arcade games...I’m a bit of a Gamerscore addict myself."

"It’s most surprising to me that the people who buy the console today download more arcade titles than the people who bought it at day one."

"...another thing that surprised us was the popularity of some of the more classic games like Uno! with the hardcore players we saw early on. If you would have asked me if that would happen, you probably would have been able to take my money. I would have bet against it. [Laughs]"

"We’ve had the luxury of being the leader in the space, and the flattery of people imitating the service but what we can’t do, I feel, is sit still and rest on our laurels."

"We take pains to make sure that we’re not doing two of the same style of game at the same time. It’d be like launching Quake and Unreal on the same day. It’s not good for either game."

"I mean, take a look at Eets: Chowdown. That’s not necessarily a game you’d see someone producing at retail. Or Outpost Kaloki or Cloning Clyde - those are all different gameplay mechanics that haven’t been done at retail and might not have ever seen a chance at it, given the risk management associated with making a $20 million title."

"At the end of the day, [lag] is a function of how the developers code the game...Multiplayer, as you probably well know, is something of an arcane art. [Laughs]"

"I certainly wouldn’t be surprised to see all of the most popular games on MSN Games making their way onto the Xbox 360."

"I think you’ll see more community features as well, with things like Live Arcade Challenge, where you can play in tournaments and so forth."