Alex St. John, the outspoken head of online game publisher WildTangent, is not known for being a Microsoft cheerleader. 

He  left the company a decade ago in a cloud of acrimony over the direction of the DirectX technology he helped create and which turned Windows into a viable platform for computer games by improving how graphics are displayed.

On a gamers’ Web site, St. John recently criticized Windows Vista, which goes on sale to consumers on Jan. 30. He believes security features in the new operating system will create hassles for gamers and smaller developers. But when it comes to the Xbox 360, St. John gives credit where credit is due.

“Because I love giving Microsoft a hard time, I really hate having good things to say about them. But for a U.S. company to do what they did and come in and take market share, it’s a pretty impressive jump,” St. John said of the five-year-old console effort.

“There’s always a theme driving gaming. First it was 2D, then with the PS2 it was the transition to 3D. The big transition for this generation is going to be online play, and Microsoft has the best position there,” he told Reuters.

St. John also joined the chorus of praise for Nintendo’s motion-sensitive Wii console, saying Sony stumbled by focusing too much on hardware rather than the consumer’s actual experience.

When he’s not running his company or opining about his former employer, St. John can be found roaming the virtual landscape of “World of Warcraft”, the hugely popular online role-playing game.

“I have two teenaged daughters who go to school in Maine. We interact by playing ‘World of Warcraft’ at night. We’re 3,000 miles away and we play ‘WoW’. I’m a Tauren warrior. My daughters all wanted to be magic-casters so they needed me as the muscle.”

No word on whether he’s brought them The Sword of a Thousand Truths.