Ashley Bates

Skelmersdale

Gaming Editor at Cultured Vultures

the eepiest boi @CultVultures

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Articles

Incredibly Ambitious PSP Games That Pushed Handheld Gaming

5 days ago | culturedvultures.com | Ashley Bates

The PSP was ambition personified, so much so that it’s kinda wild to look back and realise what exactly Sony cooked up in 2004. For a 21 year old handheld, the PSP shot for the moon with its tech, and so did today’s games. Boxer’s Road 2: The RealRemember boxing games, anyone? Seems like the gaming industry bloody doesn’t, as EA have left the Fight Night series dormant, and the last proper boxing game we got was Undisputed, which was fine.
Absolutely Beautiful Sega Genesis Games

1 week ago | culturedvultures.com | Ashley Bates

The three most beautiful sights in this world are: 1) your spouse on your wedding day 2) the birth of your first child 3) a walkthrough for Ecco the Dolphin in some long forgotten scrawl. Expect that and more as we explore some rather corking looking Sega Genesis games, starting with a sadly pretty faded star.
Insanely Ambitious PS2 Games Nobody Played

2 weeks ago | culturedvultures.com | Ashley Bates

Try to think of a PS2 game that changed gaming as we know it. GTA 3, Silent Hill 2, even things like SOCOM were way ahead of the curve, among countless others. But there are also plenty of PS2 games that shot for the moon and ended up lost in the ocean. Haven: Call Of The KingUnquestionably a victim of its own ambition, Haven: Call of the King was all set to be the action adventure hit that Midway Games and Traveller’s Tales were looking for on the PS2.
Date Everything (Xbox Series) REVIEW

2 weeks ago | culturedvultures.com | Ashley Bates

Have you ever thought about having a romantic or even sexual relationship with your everyday furniture? No, of course you haven’t — you’re normal. Probably. Clearly though, the team over at Sassy Chap Games aren’t normal at all, as their debut game Date Everything allows you to don a special pair of glasses called the Dateviators, giving you the ability to Directly Acknowledge a Thing’s Existence.
GBA Games Stuck On the Handheld

2 weeks ago | culturedvultures.com | Ashley Bates

The GBA had a short but wonderful life. The handheld hamster made quite the mark despite only being Nintendo’s main handheld for three years before the DS released, so there are a lot of games for it that have either been forgotten, overlooked, or just left behind like these games.
PS2 Licensed Games That Don't Suck

4 weeks ago | culturedvultures.com | Ashley Bates

Did you know that licensed games can often be bad? It’s true! While you pick yourself off up the floor, it’s time for me to prove that the PlayStation 2 actually had quite a few licensed games that were some of the best games on the system. The Simpsons: Hit & RunMe not mention Hit & Run? That’s unpossible. The Simpsons’ history with video games has been spotty at best.
Forgotten PS1 Platformers That Couldn't Beat Crash

1 month ago | culturedvultures.com | Ashley Bates

Name a better duo than a grown man and the weird PS1 platformer from his childhood that still haunts his dreams. While the Jorted wonder and Spyro of dragon fame may have become video game royalty, these PS1 platformers had no such luck, and have mostly been forgotten about over the years, some rightly, some a bit unfairly. Let’s start today’s episode with quite the cheeky scamp. RascalLook at how bloody cool the main character is on the cover of Rascal.
Onimusha 2: Samurai's Destiny (Xbox) REVIEW

1 month ago | culturedvultures.com | Ashley Bates

There’s perhaps few game franchises out there right now that have such a celebrated legacy but are mostly inaccessible quite like the Onimusha series. It took around 15 years since the last proper Onimusha game for Capcom to start re-releasing them for modern platforms with Onimusha 1 in 2019, and now, six years later, they’ve finally dropped Onimusha 2: Samurai’s Destiny.
Blades Of Fire (Xbox) REVIEW

1 month ago | culturedvultures.com | Ashley Bates

Despite being one of the bigger European developers going at the minute, MercurySteam’s back catalogue is pretty light on original games. Their most famous offerings are games like Castlevania: Lords Of Shadow and Metroid Dread, which should give you some idea on their Metroidvania legacy, but Blades Of Fire is their first proper attempt at making an original single-player adventure.
Capcom Fighting Collection 2 (Xbox) REVIEW

1 month ago | culturedvultures.com | Ashley Bates

Capcom’s collections of fighting games are made with two types of people in mind: the hardcore, and those who are new to fighting games and would love to experience a bit of history. The former category doesn’t need a review like this, as they’ve got their pre-orders locked in already in the hopes that it’ll inspire Capcom and SNK to greenlight a third entry in their crossover series. Quality doesn’t matter, it’s about celebrating the past to try and revive a future.

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Ash Bates @donovan_ryder

12 Jun 25

That's my king right there.

Polygon @Polygon

Dave Bautista is making a game and cartoon about a Cat Assassin https://t.co/oJhBWpyT0G https://t.co/6qALjPNkSk

Ash Bates @donovan_ryder

8 Jun 25

I know I'm late tweeting this, but ending a showcase with a Call of Duty announcement starring Jess from Gilmore Girls is one of the most baffling decisions I've seen in a while. Good showcase up until then though.

Ash Bates @donovan_ryder

6 Jun 25

#cocksoutatsummergamefest