Thanks to the guys over at Joystiq, we have some screenshots that show Hulu Plus on the Xbox 360. There’s also an image of the Kinect Hub with Hulu and Netflix. The Hulu and Avatar Kinect apps are said to be “fully functional,” with good tracking of movements, according to the source. The Hulu interface looks like the Xbox Dashboard, with a rotating layer of categories and selectable content.

We don’t know whether Hulu Plus will be added to the current public beta test of the next Dashboard update, but we hope so. It looks pretty good in pictures.

Kinect owners now have the ability to sort through their videos without using a controller. After you download the 43Mb update all you have to do is wave your hand for the camera or say Xbox and it will pull up the new menu above, which auto sorts selections for browsing by voice or gesture what it thinks you want to watch next. Pretty neat. Who needs controllers?

Select “browse all” and you are back to the standard menu. You can also pause the movie during playback by saying Xbox, Pause (or FF, rewind, skip scene, etc.). That will come in very handy. What do you think?

It looks like Microsoft may announce plans to introduce Silverlight for the Xbox 360. The company will apparently detail its plans at the MIX11 conference next week in Las Vegas. This has been planned for months and Microsoft had already revealed that it was planning to bring Silverlight to the Xbox.

This seems like a good plan for Microsoft, to bridge the gap between it’s mobile, PC and Xbox platforms. It ties in with their plans for Windows 8 as well.

While the Xbox 360 is still outselling the PS3 in the US, new data from Strategy Analytics shows that globally, Sony’s console reached 43.4 million at the end of 2010, compared to 42.9 million for Microsoft’s system. Take that Xbox.

In comparison, the Wii’s worldwide installed base was 75.5 million at the end of last year. If you have been paying attention, global demand for Sony’s PS3 has exceeded that of the Xbox 360 for the past two years, and there’s no reason to think it will stop this year. Microsoft needs to keep innovating and build on the success of the Kinect to compete.

The number of Xbox 360 users who download games is on the rise. 55 per cent of all Xbox 360 users bought at least one downloadable game last year. That number is up from 43 per cent in 2009. Also according to data from market research firm EEDAR, 50 per cent of PlayStation 3 users and 43 per cent of Wii users are down loading games.

Those PS3 numbers are up from 42 per cent in 2009, with the Wii numbers up from 37 per cent. So yes, it looks like downloading digitally is on the rise. Should Gamestop be worried? Probably not yet, but they must be keeping a sharp eye on these figures.

Ben Heck, the man behind thousands of awesome mods is back. This time it’s an old school 1977 Atari merged with the Xbox 360 in a laptop kind of deal. This custom mod looks just like Atari would have made the device had they been capable.

It will handle all of the newest games and the old, including Yar’s Revenge and Star Raiders. In his latest show, he takes viewers through the entire build process. The final build is a thing of geek beauty. He has done it yet again.

The Xbox 360 is about six-years old. The PlayStation 3 and Wii almost the same age. Microsoft and Sony had said that their current consoles will have 10-year life cycle and it looks like they were pretty on target. A Wii 2 is even expected this year to compete with the 360 and PS3′s Kinect and PlayStation Move motion controllers.

Now we have word that Square Enix, makers of Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest to name a few, are already planning to open a 100 staff studio in Canada next year. This way they will be ready for the next generation consoles and get their games out accordingly.

This generation of consoles is pretty long-lived. It’s taking awhile before a new model is released. But the time is drawing near. Now, an online portfolio of a team member of Microsoft’s Interactive Entertainment Business Design Group has said that a new Xbox is scheduled for a 2015 release.

They have already started work on it this month. If this is true, then it means that the Xbox 360 will be a decade old when the new model arrives. We know that Microsoft was recently searching for engineers who are willing to work on its next-generation console.

After selling 500,000 units of the Nintendo 3DS handheld on day 1 in Japan, Nintendo has hit another milestone. Amazon UK has announced that they have received more pre-orders for the 3DS than any other gaming console they’ve previously sold.

The Xbox 360, PS3 and the Wii all come in second to Nintendo’s portable glasses-free 3D gaming sensation. They didn’t reveal the exact numbers, but 3DS pre-orders were 20% higher than the PS3, 56% higher than the Wii and 255% higher than the DSi. Looks like the big N has a huge hit on it’s hands.

No surprises here. We knew that the Kinect has been a complete success. Since it was released last year, the motion control device for the Xbox 360 has been flying off of store shelves like crazy. Now it looks like the Kinect has set a new world record too.

In the first 60 days it was on sale, it sold an average of 133,333 units per day, for a total of 8 million units in those 2 months alone. And these figures were units that left the store and went home with customers. Not the shipments that were sent to retail stores. It’s amazing when you think about it. The Kinect beat the iPhone and iPad for the equivalent periods after launch. These numbers for the Kinect will be in the Guinness World Records Gamer’s Edition book that will be available early next year.

Microsoft may be working on the next generation Xbox, which we might as well call the Xbox 720. This speculation comes from some recently posted some job listings on Linkedin for what seems to be Microsoft’s next generation console.

There are listings for an Audio/Video Hardware Architect, an Audio Architect and a Graphics Architect and the listings reference ‘next generation’ consoles, so this isn’t wild speculation. We have no idea when we might see a new console, but at least they are working on it.

Check out the Official WWE All Stars Arcade BrawlStick for Xbox 360 and PS3. Now you can lay the smack down with an arcade style joystick. This BrawlStick from Mad Catz features a redesigned ball top joystick and high quality concave action buttons for gaming precision.

Wrestling fans will love the graphics and you can get right into the game without having to manually configure the buttons since Mad Catz has already pre-programmed it. It will cost you $79.99.

Is your home theater still using the old mouse and keyboard combo? Well Veho has announced the “Mimi wifi Keyboard & Air Mouse with game controller.” It looks like an Xbox 360 gamepad controller, but this one has everything you want in an all-in-one computer-controller.

It features a motion sensor to control the mouse, separate buttons for left and right clicking and a range of about 33 feet. It’s compatible with both Windows and Mac via a USB dongle, but the customizable buttons will only work on a Microsoft OS machine. It will cost you about 150 dollars (or £90).

SteelSeries has announced the Siberia v2 for PS3 headset for serious gamers. This headset is for the PS3, but will still play nice with other platforms like the Xbox 360, PC and Mac. It features comfortable leather earcups for those long hours of gaming, impressive audio reproduction for optimal directional sounds, and independent audio/voice volume.

It uses lightweight material, so your ears will be comfortable for the duration of your gaming session and 50mm driver units will deliver superior sound reproduction. The SteelSeries Siberia v2 for PS3 will arrive in the third quarter for $119.99.

Do you have a spare Mini Cooper in your garage? If so, maybe you can make an awesome gaming chair out of it like Designer David Gawthorpe did with this halfcut of a Mini Cooper. It took two-years to do, but he stuck with it and the end result is pretty stunning.

It opens up to reveal a force feedback chair, speakers, a racing wheel, and pedals for all your racing games. There’s also a mini fridge, strobe lights and even a smoke machine. Beneath the seat there is an Xbox 360 console. It will cost you $12,883 (£8000) and it is in London.