So anyway, here’s a bit of Gabe history:

He was born on the 3rd of November (yes, the 3rd) in 1962, in the USA.

During his youth, he studied at Harvard University, however he dropped out in 1983, at the age of 21. Later that year he was hired by Steve Ballmer of Microsoft to be the 271st employee of the company, where he worked on Microsoft Windows as a lead developer and producer of some of the first versions of the Windows Operating System.

 

Above: Gabe Newell in his Youth

Gabe worked at Microsoft for 13 years, however he began to gain an interest in video games and the entertainment industry after witnessing the success the original Doom, and also seeing some of his colleges, including Michael Abrash quit Microsoft to go work for id Software on Quake.

In 1996 Gabe Newell left Microsoft, along with another of his colleagues, Mike Harrington. This was the creation of Valve. The two both cashed their Microsoft stock to start the studio and on the 24th of August that year, the same day Gabe also got married, Valve was registered as a company.

After that came everything we know of Valve today, Half-Life, Team Fortress, Counter-Strike, Steam, Portal, Left4Dead, Dota2.

                                        

Gabe Newell has shaped the way we play, consume and make games. His vision for Valve has pioneered the company from a small office to a now multi-million dollar company.

“C’mon, people, you can’t show the player a really big bomb and not let them blow it up.”

– Gabe’s ‘most significant contribution to Half-Life’ from 1998.

His success has also been recognised by several commendation awards, including the 2010 GDC Pioneer Award and most recently, the 2013 BAFTA Fellowship award.

Gabe remains the president of Valve and over the many years of Valve’s success as a company, his innovation, commitment and drive for the gaming industry has been apparent in both Valve’s products and the entire entertainment industry as a whole.

Gabe Newell is no doubt one of gaming’s greatest revolutionaries.

On a final note, here is a video of 4chan celebrating Gabe Newell’s 50th last year:

Article Sources

Gabe Newell Person Profile on GiantBomb

Vic for his research from our article last year on Gabe’s 50th

Oh and thanks to Unq for exporting the infamous ‘aaatrigger’ texture