Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus

A few years ago, if you had approached me on the street, introduced yourself with a firm but polite handshake, and promptly asked me what the best Sly Cooper game was, I would have discreetly wiped my shaken hand on my jeans and replaced it in my pocket while informing you that the best Sly Cooper game, as everyone knows, is Sly 2, of course, wished you a swell day, and shuffled quickly away to avoid further social interaction. And if you had caught up to me and stopped me with a hand on my shoulder and badgered me to explain my opinion, I would have asked you to refrain from touching me and told you that the third game was far too bloated with gimmicky side missions, while the first game was too simplistic. Years have passed, however, and a recent replay through the Sly trilogy, as well as some thought about the state of platformers in general, has convinced me that I would have misinformed that touchy stranger. After serious reflection, I have arrived at an inescapable conclusion: though raccoon burglar enthusiasts the world over swear up and down that the greatest game of the Cooper trilogy is Sly 2 (let's ignore the segment of fans who claim it is Sly 3—they are monsters), Sly's best outing, in fact, remains his first.

While most Cooperheads decry Sly 1's linearity and consider its corridor-like level design its greatest detriment, they ignore the numerous problems that the later games' nonlinear worlds present. Chief among these is that the context sensitive platforming fails to hold up sufficiently in more open environments. With every jump and press of the circle button that players make, there is a possibility, due to the context sensitive nature of the platforming, that Sly will land on a rope or latch onto a pole or swing from a hook that the player never intended the raccoon to touch. As a result, when the level design is nonlinear and presents multiple context sensitive paths for Sly to traverse in any direction, all stacked on top of each other, the probability of a context sensitivity-related error increases exponentially. Try to land on a lofty spire in the nonlinear castle level of Sly 2, and you might just find your raccoon thief leaping to a light post 50 feet below. Thanks to Sly 1's linearity, however, Sucker Punch is able to constrain the context sensitive paths available to the player at any given time, and the result is a platforming experience less prone to context sensitivity mix-ups and interruption. Though the resulting linear level designs are simpler, they are much more refined mechanically than the open over-worlds of the later Sly games.

Another key advantage Sly 1 has over its sequels is its short length. Brevity is not always a positive trait in a video game, but when the mechanics are as rudimentary as the platforming in the Sly Cooper series, which involves little skill beyond jumping and pressing the circle button with good timing, extending the game's length would only expose the mechanical simplicity beneath the hood. I think Sucker Punch knew this even as they developed the longer sequels, as they jam-packed Sly 2 and 3 with an inordinate number of distracting side missions, many of which involve absolutely no platforming at all and do nothing to develop the key mechanics of Sly's thievery—perhaps, beyond chasing industry trends (see below), they were afraid of exposing the somewhat shallow nature of these mechanics by including too many Sly platforming missions. Granted, Sly 1 has its fair share of awful non-platforming missions as well: the shooting-gallery Murray missions, the twin-stick shooter missions, the atrocious van race, and, worst of all, the boss fight against Mz. Ruby, a rhythm mini-game that is such an unfitting conclusion to the third level that it nearly destroys the otherwise thick, haunting atmosphere of the swamp. Yet, while Sly 1 is no stranger to the distracting side-missions of the later games, it lessens their negative impact both by being a shorter game overall and by featuring primarily only one playable character in its platforming segments—there are no Bentley or Murray or (god forbid) Guru missions that make navigation through levels an unfun chore.

What Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus represents is the last gasp of a style of old-school platformer that no longer existed by the time the likes of Jak II rolled around—a style of platformer confident in the knowledge of what it is: a simple platformer. It is the type of game almost uncorrupted by the idea that platformers are somehow inherently simplistic—the idea that only by cramming shit-loads of irrelevant shooting missions and open-world mechanics and dark, mature storylines onto the disc could a platformer truly reach greatness and transcend its infantile genre. What such old-school platformers understood better than those embarrassing mid-2000s platformers, and even many modern ones, is that the inclusion of irrelevant side-missions and mechanics leads to an unfocused game. Despite some obvious aforementioned missteps, Sly 1, unlike Jak II or Sly 3, doesn't ever extend itself so far in some non-platforming direction to the point of losing its identity and thereby largely avoids the pitfalls of fellow platformers of its era, which were mired in shallow mini-game side missions and underdeveloped open world mechanics due to their lack of focus. I say "largely avoids" because the warning signs were already present: in its shooter side-missions, Sly 1 exhibits at least some insecurity at being a "mere" platformer, and these moments of doubt prevent the game from reaching its full potential. Despite these unfortunate distractions, Sly 1 has just enough of that old-school platformer DNA to be enjoyable without being bogged down in a plethora of industry-trend-chasing game design choices, and the result is a raccoon romp more enjoyable than its unfocused follow-ups.

Final rating: 3.5/5

Mostra certa idade, mas ainda é um stealthizinho divertido e com variedade suficiente pra não cansar. Os personagens são muito legais.

Out of all of the new 3D platformer mascot trilogies on the PS2, Sly Cooper was the underrated one. It could’ve been because Sucker Punch was a new Sony developer with only one game on the N64 under their belts. It could be because Insomniac and Naughty Dog had better fission with each other and kept Sucker Punch out of their friendly, competitive brew-ha-ha. It could be because both companies had more air time with commercials than Sucker Punch (which isn’t true. I knew about Sly Cooper from watching commercials on Cartoon Network at the time while I heard about the other two series from word of mouth). Sly Cooper didn’t seem like it was in the running against Ratchet and Jak as the supreme 3D platformer mascot at the time, but now we see it a third of a holy trinity of PS2 series. I grew up loving all three of these PS2 trilogies and saw them as a collective, and that wasn’t just because I played all of them around the same time on the same system. The Sly Cooper trilogy, while not getting as much limelight as the other two series, had as much charm, character, creativity, and stellar presentation as the other two. This level of quality was what tied all three of these series together. I’m glad other people who played these games group, Sly Cooper, in with the other two series in retrospect as I always did. In saying this, one detriment to the Sly Cooper series compared to the other two is that it had the weakest first entry out of the three series. The first Sly Cooper game is not a rough prototype for the rest of the series to have built upon like the first Ratchet & Clank nor is it a unique entry that has its own strengths like the first Jak and Daxter. The first Sly Cooper game is different from the other two in the trilogy, but it’s not a case of the developers having to radically change their IP due to the first entry being too exemplary to recreate like the first Jak and Daxter. The first Sly game is a favorite to quite a few people, but I’ve always thought it to be a bit underwhelming.

A silhouetted figure is running across the rooftops of a city with a French flag and the Eiffel Tower to signify that it’s Paris. The figure shows himself to be Sly Cooper, an anthropomorphic raccoon with blue clothes, a red backpack, and a cane with a golden arch. Once you press start, the game catapults you into the action as Sly radios in his nerdy turtle friend Bently about their operation to steal a book kept in a police vault. The operation goes smoothly until Sly is ambushed by Inspector Carmelita Fox (she’s a fox and she’s also a fox. Get it?) who tries to take Sly into custody by force with her shock pistol. Sly makes a quick getaway in his team’s van and gives us some context to who he is and what he just stole. Sly is a master thief who comes from a long line of master thieves who specialize in stealing from criminals. The book he stole back is the Thievius Raccoonus, a relic from his family that is composed of thieving information that each member puts in themselves. When Sly was a kid, a group called the Fiendish Five killed his parents and ransacked his house for the book, ripping vital sections of it for themselves. Sly and his two friends Bently and Murray must venture around the world collecting the missing pages of the Thievius Raccoonus and bring the ones responsible for his parent’s death to justice.

The second generation of 3D platformers sure wore their influences on their sleeves. As Jak and Daxter were influenced by the likes of Banjo Kazooie, Sly Cooper takes obvious elements from franchises like Metal Gear Solid and Crash Bandicoot. Sly Cooper is a franchise that mixes elements of stealth in the rooted base of a 3D platformer. In Sly Cooper, everything in the environment can be readily used to traverse or used as a means for stealth. Sly’s nimbleness allows him to climb up pipes, perch himself onto spires, latch onto hook-like objects with his cane, etc. When he needs to be stealthy, he can sidle against walls, quickly cover himself behind barriers, and even make himself invisible. You can probably imagine that Sly controls extremely well considering all of these different moves he can pull off. If he didn’t control smoothly, the game would be unplayable. Fortunately, Sly’s versatile move set is backed by buttery smooth controls with an excellent framerate to boost. This is certainly a must for any platformer, but how does it lend to the stealth aspects? Sly will often find himself encountering guards with flashlights that are meant to be snuck around because they have ranged attacks that will home in if he gets caught. There are also yellow security beams scattered everywhere and if Sly comes into contact with one of them, he’ll trigger an alarm. The beams turn red and Sly will be incinerated if he contacts them again. Smooth controls for being stealthy are entirely necessary because of these obstacles. Combining stealth elements in a 3D platformer was probably uncommon at the time, so I’m glad the developers managed to execute both of these firmly with the controls.

One of the more outstanding aspects of Sly Cooper is its presentation. Sly Cooper is ultimately a franchise with a younger demographic in mind, but that doesn’t mean that it has to be sickeningly cute. Sly is stylized as a cartoon with its cel-shaded animation and comic book-like presentation. The tone is rooted in film noir, a choice in the presentation made to accentuate Sly’s role as a thief. The introductions of each chapter in this game highlight each of these presentation aspects wonderfully. Sly narrates the background of each Fiendish Five member like narration in a noir film, presented with animated, comic stills. The intro concludes with a title card with the name of the chapter similar to a noir film, and it could also be like introducing an episode of a cartoon as well. As far as the Metal Gear Solid influence, the influence isn’t entirely obvious, but it was the pinnacle of the stealth genre at the time. That, and the codex calls between Sly and Bently, talking heads jabbering about secret operations, is very reminiscent of the calls between Otacon and Snake.

The direction in Sly Cooper is more obviously inspired by Crash Bandicoot. Every level is a linear path to get an item, in this case, a key. There are approximately seven levels per hub world, but the hubs are far more intricately designed than the hubs in Crash Bandicoot. Once you get each key per level, Sly can access the area with the boss. Sly also dies in one hit like Crash but can take more damage if he collects a horseshoe that he wears on his red backpack. Sly can also upgrade to a golden horseshoe that allows him to take two hits instead of just one. Horseshoes are readily available in the levels, but can also be acquired by collecting 100 coins. This health system is copy and pasted from acquiring 100 wumpa fruit to get Aku Aku as a protector in Crash Bandicoot. Also, the linear platforming levels naturally lend themselves to Crash Bandicoot comparisons. However, I do not think Sly Cooper executes this type of direction as well as the Crash series. Linear 3D platformers were never really my forte and I’ve always much preferred the open-world-Esque 3D platformers. The areas of the latter type of games feel much more fleshed out and give substantial weight to the world. I didn’t mind it in the Crash series because everything about that series was simple, thus the simple, linear level design was warranted. Sly presents us with so much interesting background about the character and his Robin Hood-like persona that it’s a shame the design of the game doesn’t match the same level of intricacy that the presentation does.

The linear level design of Sly Cooper also doesn’t work because the game is too easy. There are some levels in the Crash series that require several accurate maneuvers in jumping, defeating enemies, and getting past obstacles that will take a little while to get past and potentially have you farm lives for insurance. In Sly Cooper’s case, the environment and enemies are designed to be accessible for Sly, plus the more refined controls also help quite a bit. Sly might need one horseshoe to get through a level, but having the golden horseshoe almost guarantees that Sly will easily get through it. Areas that are more focused on stealth can be tense at times because Sly can only get hit once, but the game is still lenient with error. The strength of the levels is intertwined with the acrobatics Sly can pull off rather than presenting a substantial challenge. It’s still fun, but I felt much more entranced by the difficulty of Crash Bandicoot than I was by testing out the capabilities of Sly’s moveset.

The levels are still enjoyable because of the variety each hub world presents. Besides effectively catering to Sly’s range of movement, each main level takes place in a different area of the world. I can probably attribute my interest in geography as a kid to playing Sly Cooper because each area is different and geographically dispersed. Besides the obvious location of Paris at the tutorial level, each of these areas is somewhat based on real-world locations. The Welsh coastline is a rainy, craggy graveyard of pirate ships. Mesa City is a discount Las Vegas centered in a dry, canyon region of Utah. Haiti (no specific region) capitalizes on the country’s voodoo lore for a spooky level filled with ghosts and witch doctors. China is snowy and mountainous, and everything about this area from the enemies to the architecture screams orientalism. Using the unique geography of each of these places is how the developers get away with using the platformer trope of providing different themed areas to keep the game fresh. Mesa City is essentially a desert area, China a snow level, and Haiti a Halloweeny area. All of these are staples in the platformer genre, but the real-world elements give these areas a substantial identity not only between the levels in the game but the Sly Cooper franchise. Mesa City has Sly jumping on roulette tables and climbing on neon fixtures on rooftops. Haiti has Sly sliding across vines from mammoth-sized swamp monsters, all the while batting at ghosts made of purple ectoplasm. Crash Bandicoot may have offered more of a challenge, but Sly accomplishes something in its level variety. These levels are also encouraged to be searched thoroughly and played more than once because of the bottle clues, the game’s only collectible. Across most of the levels, around 20-40 bottles will be scattered about that amount to unlocking a code to a vault with a page of the Thievius Raccoonus in it. A lot of these pages unlock special moves varying in usefulness, but this collectible gives the player an incentive to explore these levels and they make sense in the grand scheme of the story as well.

The developers of this game should’ve better centered their focus on achieving variety through different level foregrounds instead of going overboard with it via gimmicky levels. Besides platforming levels, the developers implemented other types of levels in the vein of vehicle levels and mini-games. Some levels have Sly piloted a floating orange cruiser equipped with blaster turrets. The biggest problem with these levels is the fact that there are so many obstacles in Sly’s way, so most of the level will be tediously blasting away at the hard-wearing obstacles. The mini-game levels involve preventing crabs from stealing treasure, whacking chickens (this level is also a total upset of tone from the Haiti level), and lighting torches with the body grease of piranhas. These mini-games are quick and easy, but ultimately pointless. Sometimes, Carmelita will show up and try to subdue you with her shock pistol again. These levels are designed exactly like any normal platforming level only with pistol blasts in the background. Fortunately for Sly, Carmelita has the aim of a drunk Stormtrooper, so she never poses much of a threat. The absolute worst gimmick levels are the ones with Murray. He’s not utilized as much in this game besides being Sly’s friend and the driver, so I guess the developers implemented him in these levels so you wouldn’t forget about him. Considering what they did, I’d rather be ambivalent towards Murray than be frustrated with him. One gimmick level has Sly protecting Murray as he escorts him through a road with guards coming around corners to whack him. Murray is utterly defenseless, so Sly has a turret gun at the helm to protect him. The difficulty comes from how feeble Murray is matched with shooting Murray on accident. The even worse gimmick levels are the two races. The team van controls like dogshit and winning is a matter of being fortunate that the CPUs don’t steal the boosts. Platforming as Sly is such a strong aspect of this game and it never gets tiring, so why did the developers overdo it with these gimmicky levels? They should’ve been confident enough with the platforming levels, but the gimmick levels tied in here make it apparent that the developers weren’t confident enough that the platforming levels were enough. The platforming levels are by far the strength of Sly Cooper, and these gimmick levels never prove themselves as welcome additions to the game.

The simplicity of this game also doesn’t bode well with its characters. Sly is naturally the main protagonist being the titular character and all, but all of the other main players are so underutilized that it begs the question as to why they are even there. Bently is the brains of Sly’s gang and the technological master. He’s a man of extraordinary intellect, but we never really get to relish in Bently’s genius. He’s essentially a glorified tutorial as he nasally gives Sly directions to new obstacles the game throws at you (I must get this point out of the way now that it’s mentioned. Throughout every game in the series, Bently will tell you how to execute a move by literally telling Sly the button combination the player has to do. What to do isn’t presented as a text blurb somewhere briefly on screen, it’s a voiced line by the characters to “press the circle button” and what not to do a certain move. I didn’t think much of this as a kid, but it kind of irks me as an adult. I can’t tell if this is endearing because of how silly it is or if it pulls me out of the immersion. Is this a fourth-wall-breaking element taken from the Metal Gear Solid series or something? All of these moves are told through codex calls after all). Sometimes Bently’s cautious nature clashes with Sly’s daring attitude which is entertaining, but it happens so often that Bently starts to get annoying. I’ve already explained in detail why Murray feels underutilized. Sly even refers to him as a part-time burden in the beginning cutscene, and I’m not sure why the developers decided to make him the player’s part-time burden as well. Carmelita has steamy romantic chemistry with Sly but doesn’t pose much of a threat. Her voice actor also did a terrible job giving her character the passion she’s supposed to have. The voice acting also is a problem for Sly for the same reason. Sly is supposed to be cool and confident, but his voice actor puts it on a little too thick and he sounds emotionless as a result. He approaches each Fiendish Five member so nonchalantly that it’s almost like they didn’t kill his parents or anything.

The members of the Fiendish Five are a colorful crew of baddies that are also each level’s final boss. Each of them offers unique fights and serves a unique purpose in the gang. Raleigh is a bourgeois frog turned pirate who is the tech-worker of the Fiendish Five. Muggshot is the dim-witted, gangster-inspired muscle of the gang. Mz. Ruby is a mystical supernatural worker, and the Panda King is the disenfranchised demolitions expert. They are all also a bit underwhelming in certain aspects. They are presented like the bosses in Crash Bandicoot, animal bosses with their own gimmicks one has to exploit to defeat them. The bosses in Crash Bandicoot are fine because the game is so simple, but Sly Cooper introduces us to all of these bosses with so much exposition with their own levels surrounding their personas that their encounters feel so anticlimactic. All of these fights are also incredibly easy, with Mz. Ruby’s fight being an unexceptional exception due to the broken rhythm-game gimmick.

Then there’s the fifth member of the Fiendish Five: Clockwerk, a giant menacing, mechanical owl fueled by his hatred for the Cooper Gang. Unlike the other members of the Fiendish Five, ripping up the Thievius Raccoonus was directly motivated by relinquishing the Cooper legacy, or so he thought. The final act up to Clockwerk is all climax as Sly and the gang utilize their talents to their fullest. Murray drives up to the peak of the volcano in the van with Sly clearing explosive ordinances and debris off the path. He then clears away monstrous, volcanic blobs to get Sly inside of the heart of Clockwerk’s lair. Bently then has to save Sly after he falls into one of Clockwerk’s traps by hacking the mainframe. It’s nice that Bently finally gets to shine, but it feels uneven implementing something new in the climax of the game. The player then gets to play as Carmelita of all characters and helps Sly climb further up the volcano to face Clockwerk. Clockwerk is not an anti-climactic fight like the others. He makes his gigantic presence known with more exposition, detailing his hatred for Sly and his family. His fight is also in three acts without any checkpoints, so you know this final fight means business. The first two acts involve shooting at him with Carmelita’s weaponized jetpack, in which Carmelita exposes weaknesses in Clockwerk’s armor with shock pistol blasts. The real struggle here is maneuvering the jetpack with inverted PS2 controls. As Clockwerk plunges into the lava, Sly has to get past tons of laser security to make it to Clockwerk’s head to deal the final blows. Once the fight is done, the remnants of Clockwerk simmer in the lava and Carmelita foolishly give Sly a five-second head start before she tries to arrest him. He uses that opportunity to cuff her to the molten rock and make a getaway with his friends. That’s a real dick move, Sly. The malevolent menace Clockwerk is dead and all's right with the world...or is it? (there is a cutscene after the credits with Clockwerk’s eyeball flashing, indicating that he’s not dead. You’d have to see this yourself for the full impact of what I’m alluding to).

The Sly Cooper trilogy on the PS2 was one of my favorite series growing up and was an exemplary new 3D platformer IP, worthy of being grouped with Ratchet & Clank and Jak and Daxter. As for the first game of the series, the aspects of it that underwhelmed me as a kid still persist into adulthood. The first entry of this series feels like an incredible premise that is undermined by its simplistic, Crash Bandicoot-inspired direction. Don’t get me wrong, I like Crash Bandicoot just fine. The simple elements of that series serve it quite well. However, I feel like the Sly Cooper series had more depth and intrigue with its characters and its story. What is presented here is a 3D platformer that plays well with some great, varied levels mixed in with some dumb gimmicks. It feels more rooted in the more rudimentary 3D platformers of the previous generation than progressing with the other second-generation platformers. The full potential of the series wouldn’t come into full form just yet, so the first game always feels like it’s a league below the sequels.

This game and its sequels were a good chunk of my PS2 youth days. I remember playing the first one when I was about 3-4 years old.... and absolutely sucking at it. I managed to get better as I got older thankfully, and just around the time I got my hands on the third game (yea for some reason I skipped out on the second one). After recently beating this game once again, I figured that the first game has indeed fell victim to the PSPFG - AKA "PS Platformer First Game" - syndrome, where the first game is woefully outclassed not just compared to its sequels, but compared to other platformers as well.

First, the good. In terms of pure platforming, this is the only game that will scratch that itch. Not to say that 2 and 3 don't have any sort of platforming, but those focused more on an open-ended nature. Here, everything is linear and built around Sly's capabilities, like rail walking, climbing, rail grinding, and of course, stealth. Thankfully, the controls actually do held up well unlike in something like, say Crash 1. Sly doesn't feel too floaty nor heavy, and moves just as well on the ground as he does in the air. The story itself also held up too, campy Saturday morning cartoon vibes rang all throughout this game, and most of the villains do get some level of depth via backstory before each new area, something I definitely appreciate. I also really like these Clue bottles, they're not too out of the way and are a really nice way to get someone new to platformers a general idea of where some secrets might be located.

So where does the outclass come in? Honestly, everywhere else. About 40-45% of this game is filled with missions that are either filler as hell, or a really dumb minigame. It gets aggravating to finish up a great platforming level, only to then be hit with something like a turret section, or a racing section, or driving a shooting vehicle, or a dumb task with a pointless timer attached to it. It even gets to the point where the main bad of world 3 ends with a rhythm minigame battle, and the last world actually IS a long line of dumb minigames with like 2 sections of actual platforming. Another big issue of mine are that the powerups you can get from the Clue's safes are worthless. Aside from the "no damage from water and bottomless pits" and maybe Clue locator and the dive, most of them like the mine and decoy just take up space in your slots, and are really only there for an easy 100% completion.

Fighting the bosses suck too. I already mention how the third one is just a rhythm game, but there are others that feel disappointing. The first one is one of those "dodge the dude chasing you until there's an opening" cases, and the final one even ends with a weird Jetpack section. The second and fourth boss at least put up some sort of decent challenge, since those require actual skill, but I wish all bosses ended up like these ones.

In the end, while I had some fun, replaying this only made me remember why I played 2 and 3 more often back when I was a kid. I can kinda appreciate it for getting me into platformers that aren't like Mario and Sonic, but that's about it.

For me Sly 1 is probably the best Sly game, I know people will call me crazy and say I must have missed something, but nope, I got the platinum trophy for all 3 main Sly games in the Sly trilogy, which I decided to check out last year after knowing about this series forever and just never getting around to playing it. Sly 1 is probably the closest to the oldschool platformers, you go through linear levels, fight enemies by whacking them with your cane, and jump across various obstacles and climb around. The levels aren't particularly long and they are designed pretty well, although there are some that are a little cheap and awkward. The story isn't anything special and pretty minimal, but one thing I really liked about this game is before you moved on to a new area the main villain of that area would be given a little backstory and what drove them into crime. I actually like that the game gave us some characterization of these villains instead of just throwing us generic villains with no explanation of who they are or why they even want you dead, mainly I'm looking at you Crash Bandicoot and Spyro. Either way, Sly is what it is a solid platforming game, with some fun level design, occasionally some frustrating and awkward platforming and a really bad final boss, yeah the final boss is really the only thing in this game I consider awful, the fight itself is alright but then you have the stupid platforming segment at the end where if you die you have to replay the start of the boss fight all over again. To me this just had slightly better design and platforming segments than Sly 2, which was a game that I felt tried to be many things at once but never really excelled at any of them, plus this game did have hidden collectibles that were fun to go back into levels and explore.