Windows 8 is a massive shift from previous versions of Windows, with its Metro user interface polarising customers. On the negative end of the scale, sitting atop a mountain of PC games and a an army of devoted gaming warriors, sits Valve’s Gabe Newell, who overnight described the new OS as a “catastrophe”.

At a gaming event in Seattle, the founder of Valve, and its online gaming platform Steam, claimed that it was enough to make him look to shift PC gaming to a Linux platform:

“The big problem that is holding back Linux is games. People don’t realise how critical games are in driving consumer purchasing behaviour,” claimed Newell. “We want to make it as easy as possible for the 2,500 games on Steam to run on Linux as well. It’s a hedging strategy. I think Windows 8 is a catastrophe for everyone in the PC space. I think we’ll lose some of the top-tier PC/OEMs, who will exit the market. I think margins will be destroyed for a bunch of people. If that’s true, then it will be good to have alternatives to hedge against that eventuality.”

While it’s not enough to completely dissuade gamers from the platform, no doubt the Redmond machine is reeling from the statement, given just how much it has riding on the next version of Windows.