By Gabriel Madway and Robert MacMillan

Activision Blizzard Inc's hugely anticipated "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" video game went on sale on Tuesday, welcomed by eager fans who lined up hours in advance of the release.

Analysts expect the game could sell 4.5 to 5 million copies globally on its first day. That would shatter the 3.6 million record currently held by Take Two Interactive Software's "Grand Theft Auto IV" — and it would mean revenues of $270 million to $300 million for Activision.

While there are now over 100,000 apps in the Apple App store, the vast majority of them were created on a shoestring budget. With customers flocking toward lower-priced program, it just doesn’t make business sense to spend big development dollars—especially on games, the App store’s most crowded category.

The issue of whether minors should be legally prohibited from buying violent video games may soon be settled – once and for all.

August was supposed to be the month video game sales turned around. Instead, they extended their slide for the sixth consecutive month.

Video game sales continued their downward spiral in July, the fifth consecutive month of declines in an industry many have referred to as “recession resistant.”

With video game sales already 12 percent behind last year's pace, video game publishers and retailers have been counting heavily on a strong holiday season to help turn things around. More and more, though, that's looking unlikely.

Video game sales in June posted the biggest year-over-year decline in nine years, rounding out a very weak first half for the industry.

Investors are predictably slamming shares of Take Two Interactive Software after Monday’s downwardly revised revenue guidance, with the focus primarily on the financial impact.

While video game sales top Hollywood’s annual box office receipts these days, they still have a lot to learn from the movie industry.

Sales of new video game software are down 7 percent compared to 2008, according to the NPD Group. But a new study by Nielsen finds that used game sales are at an all time high.

id Software, the inventor of the first person shooter genre of video games and one of the most storied studios in the gaming industry, is no longer independent.

Take-Two Interactive Software announced a multi-year partnership with Tencent Holdings, which runs China's largest instant messaging service and has a significant presence in the country’s online gaming market, to co-develop an online version of "NBA 2K" for the Asian marketplace.

The move to a controller-less gaming culture might open up the industry to an even wider audience, as Microsoft (MSFT) hopes — but if Project Natal lives up to its hype, it could negatively impact some significant industry players.