Forget DVD extras or merchandise - the real way to cash in on movie blockbusters is through video games. Movie-themed games are driving substantial purchase interest among gamers, according to Monday data from Nielsen.

Gamers were polled about games they were definitely or probably interested in buying, and X-Men Origins: Wolverine topped the list, followed by Goldfather II and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, all of which were released in the last few months.

In terms of games that have received the most online buzz for the past 60 days, Ghostbusters: The Video Game easily topped the list. Terminator Salvation and Wolverine rounded out the top three.

"Nearly a quarter of all movie-related video game buzz over the last 60 days is attributed to Ghostbusters, which was released on June 16," Nielsen wrote in a blog post.

Games geared toward younger games like the Hannah Montana, Night at the Museum, and Ice Age games generated less buzz than their more adult-themed, blockbuster counterparts, Nielsen found.

Will PlayStation 3 enthusiasts find a revamped version of the game console under the tree this holiday season?

Sony is reportedly readying a complete overhaul of the PS3, which will be released later this year, according to VG247.

The site's sources likened the overhaul to last year's New Xbox Experience (NXE), a revamped Xbox that includes streaming HD movies from Netflix, an updated dashboard, and movie and game purchases via Xbox.com.

What will the updated PS3 include? VG247 pointed to several possible new features:
- A system for players to evaluate one another
- Ability to report questionable behavior to Sony by taking screen shots
- Patches will download in the background so gaming can continue uninteruppted
- Simultaneous HDMI and digital optical outputting

What do gaming icons Richard Bartle and Ralph H. Baer have in common? They are meeting at the Games Convention Online in Leipzig to usher in the first trade show of its kind.

In case you didn't already know, Richard Bartle is the co-author of the text-based multi-user dungeons (MUD) and one of the pioneers of the massively multiplayer online game (MMO) industry. Ralph H Baer, on the other hand, helped bring gaming to the home with the Magnavox Odyssey console. He also created the first light gun game for the home.

The Games Convention Online will bring these two minds together and show audiences how far gaming has come. They will be there from July 31st to August 2nd and will have an open exhibition "From Pong to Ping: The History of Online Games" that will tell the story of gaming in four epochs.

Harmonix and MTV Games announced today the list of songs being released in their new Country Track pack. It features 21 songs from artists including Shania Twain, Willie Nelson, and more. Rock Band Country Track Pack is available for the Wii, PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, and Xbox 360.

The Rock Band Country Track Pack will hit stores in America on July 21, 2009 for $29.99. The disc will be available for a limited time only before joining the Rock Band Music Store as downloadable content.

Track list after the jump.

Those of you planning to watch Netflix movies via your Xbox on Tuesday might want to make other plans. A scheduled Xbox maintenance outage will also affect its Netflix linkup.

"While Xbox is performing this maintenance, you won't be able to instantly watch movies on your TV via your Xbox 360," Catherine Fisher from Netflix corporate communications wrote in a blog post.

The outage, which will affect Xbox Live and Xbox.com, will last all day - from 12:01am to 11:59pm Pacific time. Users will not be able to access the "My Xbox" section of Xbox.com and Xbox forums will in a read-only mode. The rest of the Web site will be operational.

The downtime will not result in any new functionality or features, according to a memo from the Xbox team.

Editor's Note: Story was updated to correct attribution.

Host Kyle Monson has guest gamers Dan Evans and Whitney Reynolds talking about E3 and, well, gaming. Other host, Brian Heater, joins the crew in spirit and interviews while covering the Entertainment Expo in L.A.

The crew covers recently released game, Sims 3, and speculates if Last Guardian (from makers of Shadow of the Colossus) will be a hot title.

Brian takes us to the show floor where he discusses booth babes with Jordan Morris and how they've changed over the years. He also takes us to an exclusive interview with pro gamer, Fatal1ty.

Tune in by going to the PC Mag After Hours site or download the show off iTunes.

Adults play their share of video games, but a new study finds that about 97 percent of kids ages 12 to 17 play video games--and often.

Half of the teens surveyed said they played video games "yesterday," according to the report from the Pew Internet & American Life Project, which interviewed kids in the fall of 2008.

Of those polled, about 86 percent used consoles such as the Xbox, PlayStation, and Wii, and 73 percent also played PC games. About 60 percent used portable devices like the Nintendo DS, while 48 percent played games on their cell phones.

What are they playing? Racing, puzzle, and sports-related games were the most popular, while virtual worlds like Second life produced the least interest.

There was not a huge difference in terms of genre preference between boys and girls, though boys were more likely to enjoy "mature" games that featured violence, gore, and rough language, Pew said.

There's little point in arguing the assertion that Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel is the best-known gamer in the world. Over the years he's become something of a media go-to on pretty much any story dealing with the world of professional gaming. It's a testament not only to his ability as a gamer--it also owes a large amount to the Missouri-born 28-year-old's ability to market himself.

As evidenced by the employees in Fatal1ty t-shirts showing off Fatal1ty-branded computer accessories on the floor of E3, his name is now as much a brand as a gaming handle.

We caught up with Fatal1ty on the floor of this year's E3 to talk about the world of professional gaming

Microsoft's Project Natal took a step away from the stage and closer to the living room when Gizmodo's Matt Buchanan and Mark Wilson took the system for a test drive.

While the preview did consist of some of the same style of tech demos we saw on Monday, the exciting part involved playing Burnout Revenge, an existing 360 game, with the system. The game was able to run even with Natal's processing overhead, controlled via an air steering wheel and moving feet forward and backward to represent the gas.

Despite their dedicated efforts to get the system to hiccup, Gizmodo was impressed with the device, commenting on how natural and polished the experience felt. Despite the usual pre-production glitches, Natal seems ready to take on the gaming world whenever it comes out. Video after the jump.

In the "cool but totally unnecessary" category, we have the $8,000 NEC CRV43, a widescreen display that curves around the user. And when NEC says widescreen, they mean wide. With 2880-by-900 resolution, this display has an aspect ratio of 32:10, as opposed to the standard widescreen 16:9.

The company has targeted this display at a variety of high-end markets, including graphics, simulation, and finance--but with its claimed response time of 0.02 ms, I wouldn't expect anything outside of the most intense PC gaming experience ever from this beast of a monitor. Regardless of the user, the CRV43 would offer a decidedly different experience (and cost) than anything else on the market.

"The NEC CRV43 curved display provides an excitingly immersive viewing experience for any type of user," said Keith Yanke, Director of Product Marketing for NEC Display Solutions.

NEC said the ultra-wide screen would eliminate the distractions of having a multi-monitor setup, with gaps between screens infringing on productivity. The display also contains USB 2.0 ports, as well as HDMI and DVI-D connectivity. Despite the LCD-esque appearance, it is widely reported that the CRV43 is actually a LED-backlit DLP display. No matter the technology, gamer bragging rights certainly don't come cheap.

Yesterday at E3 I met with a company called Fusion-io. I was largely unfamiliar with the company, save for that recent bit of news about Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak coming on board as chief scientist. That's no small bit of news, of course. While the he's been busy with extended polo games, d-list dating, and reality show flirtation, the Woz was more or less in retirement when it came to running tech companies.

At the time, Fusion-io was primarily manufacturing products for the SMB world, devices aimed at reducing the bottleneck on servers. With Woz in the picture, however, the company has taken a turn toward consumers, offering up the ioXtreme. The company was showcasing the product at E3, with help from pro-gamer Jonathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel.

The device sits in a computer's PCI Express slot, in order to "[fill] the performance gap between RAM and disk drives." I didn't get a chance to benchmark the thing at the show, but Funsion-io assures me that it's blazingly fast, and has definite applications for those doing video editing or 3D rendering.

There are applications for games, too, of course, but at $895, it's probably best to wait until the price comes down on the thing. The ioXtreme is set for a July release.

Remember the Power Glove, that controller for the NES that looked so cool when it debuted in The Wizard, but ultimately proved an unusable, if neat looking, piece of over-priced plastic? Well, the Peregrine isn't that. I mean, both game controllers built into gloves, sure, but the similarities seem to stop there.

Manufactured by a company of the same name, The Peregrine doesn't offer the gesture-based control the Power Glove promised. Rather the device is designed to offer a quick way for PC gamers to access their keyboard hotkeys without actually having to touch their keyboard.

The device has a number of built-in sensors. Touching combinations together will trigger a specific hotkey action. A total of 30 actions can be programmed into the controller. The Peregrine will arrive in Fall 2009. Pre-order is not yet available.

Not all of the consoles present at E3 this year were made by Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft--only roughly 99.9-percent of them. There was another console manufacturer on the show--Conny, a Chinese company was showing off a handheld called the M2, which, if the press material is to be believed stands for "multi-games, multimedia."

The device has a 3.5-inch LCD touchscreen, which can be used with a finger or the included stylus. There are two cameras on the rear of the device--one for stills and one for video. The handheld can also play video and music. There's also a built in accelerometer. Players can affect games by shaking the device or turning.
Perhaps the coolest thing about the M2 is that users can plug the console into a TV and use the device as a gesture-based controller for the action on screen.

The device ships with 100 games. More are available for download. The M2 has yet to come to the States, but Conny says it's working on it.

When Sony announced the latest version of its PlayStation Portable during its E3 press conference yesterday, the company laughingly referred to it as "the worst kept secret at E3 2009," which was basically true. Rumors about and pictures of the device have been floating around the blogosphere for months--and now that the PSP Go has been confirmed, it turns out that most of them were spot on.

The PSP Go has 16GB of internal Flash memory, built-in Wi-Fi, and integrated Bluetooth. It'll be arriving in stores in October, for $249. I managed to finagle my way into the roped-off portion of Sony's booth on the second day of E3 ito get some solo hands-on time with the device.

After the jump, check out exclusive video and more photos of the PSP Go.

Strap in, flight sim fans, because Logitech has announced its first force-feedback flight simulation controller, the G940, at E3. I love the authentic look and the level of detail. Logitech says it was inspired by military and commercial planes and helicopters.

This three-component system features a force-feedback joystick, dual throttle, and rudder pedals. You'll also get more than 250 programmable button options, so that you can access all your aircraft's systems without taking your hands off the controls.

The joystick has a two-stage metal trigger, six programmable buttons, a mini-stick, an 8-way hat, and three analog trim controls. The dual throttle features a split design for easy control of multi-engine aircraft. The pedals' four-bar mechanism was inspired by the designs of current jet fighters.

You'll have to wait for all this flying power, though, as the Flight System G940 won't be available until September. It will list for $299.99.