Since everyone’s on that Spyro hype I decided to talk about MY favourite mascot character – Sly Cooper! If you’ve been living under a rock, Sly Cooper is a stealth-platforming game developed by Sucker Punch, and the majority of the games in the series were on the PS2 with later HD remasters that dropped for the PS3 and Vita (The only exception to this being Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time, developed by Sanzaru Games for the PS3).
It stars the titular character Sly Cooper and his adventures being a master thief alongside his buddies Murray and Bentley – I’m just gonna say this now if you haven’t played any of the Sly Cooper games then please either punch yourself in the dick, or stop reading and at least play the first one (The best one), because this is a Sly Cooper only household and daddy is getting upset.
See while all you scrubs were out there playing your Spyro’s and Crash Bandicoot’s and Jak’s, I was busy stealing shit and being hella sneaky with the boys. No disrespect to those games either, to be honest, I just have a really special place in my heart of Sly Cooper.
The first game will always be my favourite just because I played it like a madman as a kid and because I like the extremely simple approach they had to them – Every new chapter had a small hub world with areas to unlock with keys, you go into missions through the hub world while also avoiding or fighting enemies and the missions are pretty fun platforming/stealth challenges and a lot of them turned into these really fun mini-games to change things up. The boss fights are all super memorable and interesting, with my favourite being Mz. Ruby – I think Mz. Ruby might be the reason why I’m so into rhythm games.
The story is pretty sick too; Our main man, Sly, saw his entire family be murdered right in front of his eyes by a group of baddies called the Fiendish Five, led by this one jackass named Clockwork who’s just a big mechanical owl – The reason why his parents were murdered is due to that the group being after the legendary Thievius Racoonus; the Cooper family encyclopaedia on how to be a thief, with the family’s history, riches and exploits detailed – So they tore it up, and each took pages, and now it’s up to Sly to recover them and avenge his family.
Now while I do love Sly 1 to bits, I have to admit Sly 2 & 3 are also extremely solid games – They improve upon existing mechanics, and add a lot more than what was expected and it really sticks the landing; you get more characters to play as, larger hub worlds, different skills and gadgets to unlock and much larger setpiece moments… And this is all a lot of fun, but I still prefer the simplicity of Sly 1.
I also think that Sly 2 goes on for far too long at times and becomes really goddamn boring, while Sly 3 varies it up just enough to keep my interest all throughout the game… Then we come to Sly 4, alternatively known as Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time. Sly 4 was released first on the PS3 and I cannot remember anything about it apart from it being developed by Sanzaru Games instead of Sucker Punch – I remember it being just okay and I feel like I didn’t even beat it… Or at least, I got close to beating it then just stopped playing it. The concept is pretty cool though. It involves time travel and going back to meet Sly’s ancestors and their additions to the Thievius Racoonus.
So where can you get all these amazing games? Well if you have a PS3 you’re in luck! There’s a Sly Collection available with the three games that were on the PS2! Then you’ve got Sly 4, which is also on the PS3… And if you’re feeling really frisky all these games are available on the Vita (R.I.P.) as well!
So if you’re a fan of all those other mascot characters like Jak, Ratchet & Clank, Crash and Spyro, you should definitely check out the Sly Cooper series – The games are so great and still hold up really well… And don’t worry, these games will kick your ass at some points. Some… Frustrating points. But oh well, check em out and I hope you enjoy fellow thieves!