Nielsen: Movie Games Earning Back Consumer Respect

It's the summer blockbuster movie season, and the high buzz around popular action flicks is having a positive effect on their tie-in games. Nielsen finds that movie license games are topping the list in terms of both "online buzz" and player intent to purchase, and concludes that maybe movie license games are finally getting some respect from gamers. At the top of Nielsen's purchase intent list is Activision's X-Men Origins: Wolverine for the week of its release, and it's joined by other games tied into big box office properties: Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen, also an Activision release, and the GRIN and Halcyon-developed Terminator: Salvation game. It's not just that the current film season is driving proxy enthusiasm for the associated games. Nielsen says that a few months ago, Electronic Arts' Godfather II scored well on the purchase intent list even though the movie came out in 1974. Two months away from its release, Eidos' Batman: Arkham Asylum is tied for second fifth place, and Nielsen expects it to hit number one by summer's end, while the Terminal Reality-developed Ghostbusters video game, released last week, topped the online buzz list and ranked fourth in terms of purchase interest. Nielsen says that in terms of online buzz, Ghostbusters has garnered nearly a quarter of it over the last 60 days. The following chart shows several titles based on movies gaining equal attention in the mindshare arena.