I spoke last week about dream projects and my desire to reboot Army of Two. As I said then, that beloved bro-op shooter isn’t the only game series I’d love to bring back into the light. Another one that sits very high on the perch is Sly Cooper.
Set in a world of anthropomorphic animals, the original Sly Cooper follows the titular character—a raccoon thief who comes from a long line of such—and his buddies, Bentley the super smart turtle and Murray, a lovable hippo with more muscle than brainpower. As the series evolved, more characters—many playable—were added including love interest and foil Carmelita Fox, a police detective, and a veritable gaze of Sly’s ancestors.
Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus kicked off the series in 2002. Developed by the excellent Sucker Punch and published by Sony, it was—for obvious reasons—a PlayStation 2 exclusive. (This fact lent considerable weight when I later made the decision to jump into that console generation.) Players took on the role of the three main characters as Sly sets out to retrieve the pages of the thievius raccoonus, his family’s handbook on all things thieving, from a cadre of villains including a crafty bullfrog, a powerlifting bulldog, a mystic alligator, a fire-flinging panda, and the half-machine/half-owl head of the Fiendish Five, Clockwerk.
The game introduced the core gameplay of sneaking around good-sized maps, thwacking heavies with your crook, and picking the pockets of unsuspecting guards. Mission to mission, you revisit these maps, exploring new areas, confronting new challenges, and finding precious collectibles. The mix of enemies and opportunities—and that iconic “sneaky noise”—laid down a great formula on how to make a game about stealing stuff.
The game spawned three sequels. Band of Thieves and Honor Among Thieves quickly followed on the PlayStation 2. These games built on the origin with bigger maps, more abilities, and an escalating threat. The games were ported to the PlayStation 3 as the Sly Collection in 2010. The final game, Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time, capped off the series three years later on for that same system as well as the Vita. (The main character also got a Funko POP! which isn’t, like, rare these days but it still real cool and, yes of course, I have one.)
Filled with tight stealth gameplay, bright and beautiful art direction, complex but sensible level design, whimsical dialogue, brilliant sound design, and great voice acting, the Sly Cooper series is an easy recommendation.
What’s not so easy is finding them. A few years ago, I signed up for the top PlayStation Plus tier just so I could play Thieves in Time. At least I didn’t have to break into some mechanical bird’s stronghold to grab a copy.
The Sly Cooper series blends the best of comic book thieving with afternoon cartoon visuals. Sly, Bentley, and Murray are a perfect trio in their attitudes as well as aptitudes. From sneaking into well-guarded fortresses to protecting Murray as he tries to get into top secret areas to hacking datafortresses as a digitized turtle, the games offered up a nice variety of gameplay. As new characters were added into the series, you employed new skills in new levels against bigger and badder challenges. The games had a clear vision of their strengths and built on them with each installment.
Sly Cooper is a colorful, fun, all ages stealth-action game featuring anthropomorphic creatures straight out of a cartoon and it is prime for a comeback. Not to be immodest but I think I have a pretty cool angle for just such a venture. It’s a concept I’ve dabbled with numerous times over the years because even playing make-believe in that world makes me happy. Unfortunately, I’ve never been able to make the connections necessary to have the conversations you need to have to make something like that happen.
Rumors of a Sly Cooper 5 have popped up numerous times over the years with no official confirmation. I hope Sly gets a chance to return. Obviously, I would love to be involved—this is a dream project after all—but I’d be happy just to play. I’ll take any opportunity to jump back into a world that stole my heart over twenty years ago.
