Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time review

by SaikyoBro on Feb 18th, 2013

I’ll say it right now, I think Sly 4 is an awesome game. It gave me a feeling I honestly hadn’t had in quite some time. Most reviews have said pretty much the same thing; it’s a good game, but it doesn’t change much from it’s predecessors and feels dated at some points. Well that’s fair I guess, but here’s something interesting: I’m not a Sly Cooper fan. Let me explain: I played the first few hours of the 1st game  and it felt really dated and weird. I wasn’t having much fun, and a friend told me to skip to the 2nd game, which I did and actually really enjoyed. Never played the 3rd one. So having played only one game in the series, what do I think of Sly 4?

Well, if I had to put it in one sentence, it’s the kind of game I wish they made more of. 3D platformers aren’t a common genre anymore; we still get Mario, Sonic, and Ratchet and Clank, but beyond that we don’t see more than one or two notable ones every few years. However, after being very hard to come buy in the GCN/PS2/Xbox days, the 2D platformer genre has seen a huge revival this gen; the NSMB games, Rayman Origins/Legends, Kirby’s Epic Yarn and Return to Dreamland, A Boy and His Blob, Wario Land: Shake It, Donkey Kong Country Returns, Sonic 4, LittleBigPlanet, Mega Man 9/10, and more indie games than I care to mention. Why? Well, I don’t know why. But I’m glad they’re back in such a huge way. That being said, it’s been several years since this trend started up and it doesn’t seem to be slowing down. And while it’s really cool that they’re back…what about 3D platformers? Aside from the Mario, Sonic, and Ratchet and Clank series I already mentioned, how many of those have we seen the last few years? Well, let’s see…uh…B-K Nuts and Bolts? Jak and Daxter: The Lost Frontier? Mirror’s Edge? Those games were all released to mixed reviews, and I honestly can’t think of any beyond them, not to mention them all coming out a whole 4-5 years ago. Games like inFamous and Uncharted incorporate a lot of platforming and exploring in a 3D world, but it’d be really hard to consider them “platformers.”

That’s why seeing a game like Sly 4 in the year 2013 is so awesome to me; I have a feeling it could be the start of something bigger. The way games like NSMB brought back a 2D platformer craze, the way Street Fighter IV revived the fighting game genre, I feel like this game could do something like that for 3D platformers! …well, maybe not, seeing as Sony has done such a crappy job with marketing that I’m pretty sure nobody who hasn’t been following it even knows the game is out. But it’s awesome to see Sly back nonetheless! But enough about the genre itself, what about the game? I can’t exactly compare it to the previous Sly games since I haven’t played all that much of them, but on it’s own, how is it?

The story is something you can understand pretty well even if you haven’t played the other games; Sly Cooper is a master-thief and leader of the Cooper gang, consisting of himself and his childhood friends Bentley and Murray. They’ve been in retirement for a while, but when a number of strange occurrences such as the Thievius Raccoonus (Sly’s thieving guide) beginning to have it’s pages slowly erased and Bentley’s girlfriend Penelope going missing, the team reunites to see what exactly is going on. It turns out that the answer lies in the past, so the gang ends up going back in time, all while Interpol agent (and Sly’s love interest) Carmelita Fox is chasing after them. They go through five different time periods, from ancient Japan to prehistoric times, meeting up with Sly’s ancestors along the way and setting events back to normal in order to restore the pages of the Thievius Raccoonus to how they should be.

You play as several different characters; Sly, Murray, Bentley, Carmelita, and Sly’s 5 ancestors. They all have pretty unique gameplay; Sly is the most agile of the group, and has a variety of stealth moves, from a paraglider to smoke bombs. His gameplay focuses on sneaking around without being detected and 3D platforming, which works very smoothly (if not a bit tooo smoothly, as pressing the circle button pretty much guarantees you won’t be falling off any platforms unless you’re REALLY off.) Murray’s gameplay isn’t quite as fun; it’s primarily a 3D beat ’em up, which works fine I guess, but feels a little out of place with the rest of the game. He moves much more slowly than the other characters and going to directly attack the enemies just doesn’t feel as good as Sly and Bentley’s gameplay, removing most stealth and strategy that the other characters have. Bentley is a more tactical character; he’s controlled while in a wheelchair and carrying a bunch of gadgets with him. He has bombs, darts, and can hover in the air with his wheelchair. Carmelita isn’t played as very often at all, but she carries a gun that controls pretty well and she’s alright to control. Sly’s ancestors play the same as him for the most part, but with a twist; they all have a unique gimmick. These vary from being useful and fun (like Sly’s Japanese ancestors long-jump or his cowboy ancestor’s gun) to being obnoxious and generally pointless (Sly’s knight ancestor being able to propel himself from rings on walls and his Arabian one climbing poles quickly.)

An interesting part of the game is the ThiefNet, which you access in the hideout. It allows you to purchase upgrades for your characters, and often they’re pretty substantial ones. You spend the coins you earn through the game to buy them, and they’re all pretty useful and unique. They can be purchased for all 4 of the main playable characters. Sly also finds 5 “outfits” in the game (one in each period he travels to) which give him new abilities. Again, they’re either fun and useful (his archer costume and his Arabian one) or annoying to use (his samurai costume and the animal skin.) There are secret areas and things like that you can access by exploring around and using these costumes in other worlds and things like that, usually rewarding you with collectibles like clue bottles and masks. Collecting these unlocks things such as new costumes, or new skins for Sly’s cane (including some cool Ratchet and Clank and inFamous references.) There are 60 masks in the game and 30 clue bottles in every level, so you have plenty to look for if you’re wanting to 100% the game. Something that’ll make that a little easier is the Vita AR feature, meaning if you have a Vita, you can use it to help you find collectibles in the PS3 game, which will copy over to the PS Vita version with the cross-save feature.

The worlds themselves are massive, giving you plenty to do and explore. The chapters themselves are usually between 2 and 3 hours, the game itself taking a little over 10 to complete, or much more than that if you’re trying to collect everything. Every character has several “jobs” to do in each world, which you’re required to do to move on. Most of these are pretty fun, with the exception of a few (mostly being Murray’s.) One complaint I do have is the mini-games; there are a LOT of them. Frequently, Bentley has to hack into a security system; every time you do this, you play a mini-game. There are three of them; a tank game, a shoot ’em up game, and a six-axis maze game. The first two are actually pretty fun and deep, but the third one is honest-to-God painful to play. Why am I using six-axis controls in 2013? The last time I remember using these was in Heavy Rain (which worked since the game was built around them) and little goofy things like tilting Sackboy’s head up and down in LBP. Besides that, I don’t think I’ve seen them in forever, and it’s easy to understand why. There’s another mini-game or two that uses it, but thankfully they’re relatively short so you aren’t forced to suffer through them. The mini-games besides that are honestly pretty forgettable due to them being very short and easy, like shooting galleries and some goofy game where you pass out sarsaparilla at a bar as Bentley. Lame. The only notable exception is an awesome training montage style series of games you play in chapter 3 as Sly’s caveman ancestor.

Something I’ve been seeing a lot of hate toward is the boss battles, but I love them. They feel like fun throwbacks to the kind of bosses you saw all the time in older 3D platformers. They’re pattern based and really creative in some parts, while the bosses and the character you’re playing as exchange fun dialogue. There are a couple of annoying ones, but they aren’t long enough for it to be much of a problem. The only boss fight I’d say was REALLY disappointing would be the final boss, which I won’t be spoiling. The ending itself is pretty disappointing as well, but again, not saying why. There are several segments where you control things like Bentley’s RC car that are actually pretty fun, but they’re not frequent enough to really make them worth mentioning.

The game’s absolutely oozing with charm; it’s funny and well-written with super-likeable characters. The music is awesome and varied, from pieces like “Paris by Rooftop” that perfectly set the mood, to the awesome “Getting Stronger” song that plays in chapter 3. The cel-shaded graphics look really nice, and it just generally makes you feel good playing it. The story is a little goofy, sure, but there are some genuinely good plot-twists and you end up actually caring about the fate of Sly by the end of the game. There’s also an unlockable secret ending, only obtained by collecting all the masks and clue bottles in the game, which I could see being viewed as either fun and exciting or a complete waste of time when you can just look it up on YouTube.

In the end, the game’s just…really good to see happen. The break between Sly 3 and Thieves in Time is actually the same amount of time that passed between Banjo-Tooie and Nuts and Bolts if that helps put things in perspective for some of you guys. I’m not gonna pretend that I was a huge Sly fan as a kid, but I can only imagine how passionate the fans are and I really enjoyed this game, despite having only played one prior game in the series extensively. Like I said, I’m still waiting on the huge 3D platformer revival to happen, and I’m hoping and praying that this game will play a part in that. If you’re in the same boat as me and just want a lengthy, charming, colorful 3D platforming experience to play through (that will hopefully inspire many more), I can’t recommend this game enough. Considering it’s only $40 and a Vita copy is included for absolutely free, you really have no excuse not to run out and buy this game. Besides some pretty annoying mini-games and some obnoxious outfits and ancestors you have to use, the game delivers as a fun stealth game, an awesome platformer, and a genuinely fun and awesome experience.

4/5

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