i just wish sly 4 was about sly discovering what makes him a cooper, where 1,2 and 3 discover what made the coopers and their lineage, i want sly to slot himself into their history, as you have said, most the ancestors are just sly with a new ability, sly might as well be a fanboy, hes not unique to the coopers, and having these now relatively individual characters figure out how to reslot themselves into a team would be a nice topic

really enjoy a slow newcomer take. I super love seeing how people slowly approach it, which makes it easier, vs someone like me who has played a lot. mastery of the movement really is a gamechanger against regular mobs for instance. ty

Had a HECTIC day at work but excited to sit down and unwind while watching this later tonight

I thought the combo system was pretty bland and one dimensional too, until I seen some “combo mad” combo compilations, and it blew my mind with the fast paced action and overall potential of ‘skill expression’.. def reinvigorated a second d play through on FF MODE, also,to get the ultimate weapon

Not gonna lie the world 1 boss scared me as a little kid XD

It's not the racing that the guards love so much.... They have gambling addictions. Lmao a gambling addiction will have you betting the deed to your house on black at 4am Also the first lucky charm is silver.

Honestly Bentley telling Sly that someone is screwing with the past would be reasons enough for him to do this.

Honestly the idea of a fourth Sly taking place between 1 and 2 is something that never occurred to me but would have fit so well; gives context to that two years between, lets the team experiment with different gameplay ideas (e.g. the different hacking types - Bentley by the start of Sly 2 has found it more efficient to just use the one) and doesn't encroach on the ending of the third game. I grew up with sly, and was incredibly excited at the notion of a fourth installment when I was a wee lad, but even when I played it for the first time on release I could feel that something wasn't clicking. At first I thought it was the updated visuals and animations messing with me and making certain actions look weird by comparison, but as it went on I found myself not engaged in the story and more just going through the motions, checking boxes of what I considered to be a sly experience. It kind of sucks as well; In interviews leading up to release the team kept talking about how excited they were to be making a fourth game and how it was essentially a passion project for them after loving the original trilogy, being absolutely made up when SP gave them the go ahead. You can tell they studied the hell out of Sly 2 in particular, and maybe if the story had been given a few more look overs it could have been different. Since Sanzaru is now owned by Facebook, we're probably never going to see them take another crack at Sly, and reckon the only chance we'll have of another game is SP themselves taking back the reins for one more run. Every time there's rumours of a new sly in development I still get giddy as a kipper, but since they've got their hands full with Ghosts of Tsushima 2 I doubt we'll see anything, probably ever. Selfishly, I would want a hypothetical fifth game to simply be a corrective course and just get us back to a happily ever after (have them use the time machine to stop Bentley making the damn thing so 4 never happens lol). For now though, I just treat this one as a non-canon "what if." It's written and made by fans so can I just consider it fanfiction???? I've been watching through your series of critiques over the past week and while I don't necessarily agree with all your takes, it was lush to hear an incredibly passionate fan of this series giving a full and proper breakdown, cheers!

you can change the controls through the emulation menu. It was the first thing I did when I got it. Love your videos, man, you deserve more hype

Okay I’m coming up with a weird pitch idea Instead of Sly gets jealous that Carmelita seems to like his ancestors more than him Have it kinda be a bit of a Meet the family Type story She could say she was dating Sly and Tennessee could shake her hand aggressively There was apparently a fox geisha that it’s assumed Ryoichi had a relationship with, I’d add a cut scene to really parallel and say something about Sly and Carmelita’s relationship. Most importantly I’d have every ancestor yell at sly, “STOP FUMBLING THE BAG!”

38:06 I just want to comment on how In Sly 2 Sly and Murray getting arrested was the emotional high point of the game. It meant so much and caused so much fear. It felt like the characters were just as afraid as the player. The Prague environment also reflected this. It speaks to who they are as thieves that imprisonment is such a nightmare. Sly is forced into a permanent crouch. A poetic punishment for a life of crouching and stealing Here it’s in a happy campy western level. Being arrested is the plan. The jailhouse costume they give you gives you a power up

36:54 I think Sanzaru thought they could essentially start the character arcs over The characterization wasn’t great in sly 1 but it built a foundation that led to great arcs The problem is, when you’re rebooting a franchise, you aren’t given the grace to just start an arc over.

Plot and writing were always the reasons I liked sly cooper most, more than platforming or game play or graphics And Sanzaru just showed a real lack of effort in those areas. It felt like they didn’t spend enough time on it. Either they thought it didn’t matter or they thought they did a good enough job And then When the fanbase was outraged over what they did they just stopped They ruined the franchise and didn’t even have the grace to stay and rebuild it.

I feel like the excuse I gave to sly 3, that the short production schedule led to a lack of polish, and a “toss everything at the wall” attitude Works in the opposite way with Sly 4 They were remaking the series, they should’ve had much much more time to polish up the story, but they didn’t. This may be too forward of me, but I feel like the writers looked to establish their takes on the characters, rather than taking the characters that sucker punch developed and moving them forward. I can Understand the want to make your own take on the characters, especially if you plan on taking them somewhere in further sequels. Perhaps this was their idea for the beginnings of character arcs and by game 3 they would be much more likable. On the other hand, not respecting the work that came before will and did lead to fan outrage. Sucker punch’s versions of Sly, Bentley, Murray, Carmelita, and Penelope had all finished their arcs. I could argue Penelope still had room for development which is why I push for her to be the main villain, but the point still stands. They felt like they couldn’t move forward with the characters the way Sucker Punch left them, so they felt they had to change. Perhaps it would’ve been a better idea to make sly 4 plot driven much more than character driven The plot that should’ve driven this more is very fan servicing Meeting cooper ancestors especially Ryoichi and Tennessee Kid Cooper was a great choice.

2:44:53 she’s trained in fisticuffs It’s a poor excuse but it’s something

2:35:25 it never sat right with me that the final chapter didn’t have a panda king segment Every other game sets up that the final level will use everyone

2:33:36 it honestly feels like the inclusions were sooo hit or miss. Maybe I’m wrong but I feel like the company just needed more time to expand what worked and cut what didn’t.

2:30:21 I know it’s an unpopular opinion I really loved the sailing I don’t know if it was the strategy of how to aim your cannons or the ranking system, I just really had fun with it.

There was so much good in the china level And so much bad

2:09:47 solidarity brother I think what probably made this harder was that unlike final missions that came before where they made mechanics you used in previous jobs just a bit harder, there was never anything close to this in previous missions. While I wouldn’t get rid of the missions that reference the sly 1 panda king missions, I think some mission should’ve been replaced to prep players for this.

1:56:43 it’s a small note, but I like how the hardest hacking minigame is in china, a country known for cyber security

How did I never notice how much the missions in the sly 3 china level mirror the missions in the sly 1 china level Using a turret to protect Murray Sly gets chased by Carmelita A car race I think it shows that the references to past characters weren’t just skin deep. Now if only they let Dimitri shoot lightning

As a kid I loved the funny dialogue options so I would often try to pick the wrong answers so I could hear all of the voice lines As an adult, I feel the Funneled fake choice that the dialogue options offer

I think a fair comparison to the Mask of Dark Earth as a villain would be Majora from The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask. Sure, comparing the two is a little unfair since the Mask of Dark earth is only a villain for one episode compared to Majora being the main villain (and namesake) of its game, but I feel like it highlights that the Mask of Dark Earth could've been built up as more of a threat. In Majora's Mask, the Skull Kid, under some degree of influence from Majora, causes turmoil across Termina. He blocks off Romani Ranch from the rest of the world, he poisons the swamp's rivers, (which causes even MORE problems as the Deku Princess and the monkey accused of her kidnapping come to investigate, causing the princess to become trapped in the Woodfall Temple) bathes Snowhead in eternal winter, pollutes the oceans of Great Bay, and more. Skull Kid, and by extension, Majora, have influence that can be felt no matter where you are in Termina. Most of the time, all you need to do to understand that influence, if ever you doubted, was look up. The Mask of Dark Earth fails to have influence. It fails to be threatening. Majora is a villain, the Mask of Dark Earth is an antagonist.

i don't get the hate on galactic. rose and team flare are easily worse.

I think that you should have unlocked the belly dancing outfit for Carmelita, but that Murray should have been the one to do the dance after he suggested it. It would have been far more humourous and given that he suggests it I don't see the excuse not to, it would also be a good moment for Carmelita to appreciate Murray for his consideration.

2:36:52 Triangle, Circle, Square, and WHAT????

1:21:56 i feel like it’s more of a cautionary tale for Sly Don’t let your need for revenge turn you into a monster

I want to argue that giving Bently and Murray the ability to pickpocket is a GREAT addition, not a subtraction. Because playing the games when they came out, there was obviously an agreement among young fans that we wished that we could pickpocket as Bently and Murray in Sly 2 That they now could (in their own ways) pickpocket didn't steal away that from sly, because their styles were so different. Bently was slow, and needed time between yoink-ing the loot from the mobsters, Murray could do it by picking them up, and shaking them. While Sly just does it far better, Bently and Murray learning to do it was just a logical continuation of a band of thieves. Now each of them could do a job that was originally suited for them, except they would need to have Sly there to pickpocket, and instead giving him another more fulfilling job. Instead of Sly having to instigate/faciliate for them every time, now they could be more independent, giving a chance to set him up, by using a derivative of his ability alongside their own specialization. Stacking the two mechanincs nicely It also makes them seem far more compenent than they were just 2 years prior.

I disagree with the critisism you have against 2-4 Big Truck Because you forgot to mention that there is a 2nd stage to this mission; where the training wheels, or WATER in this case, (1 of two methods to cool down your truck) is now gone. And you still got a bunch of scorpions yet to collect. This mission for me and my friends quickly went from "Yaaawn, can we get to the next one Already?" To "Okay, so Sly needs to climb all the way up, cool. There's the platforming" And when the lever is pulled; "Oh shiit, the waater is gone. Now its gone from simple resource management, to survival against the clock when moving. This shit just kicked into gear" and we often lostt to it for weeks when the game first came out. Hearing the other kids (we were all 9-10 when it came out) also struggle with the game, or being hyped over a plot twist, is something I look back at fondly.

Around 40:00 you mentioned how the operation takes a mechanic that waas established into the episode, combining multiple ones. And it made me think how right you really are. Because in this chapter; New mechanics -> use in operation is fitting for just about every single one Job specific mechanic is just geared up for the actual Operation. And that is Sly in a nutshell; Every job kinda function as part of its own tutorial before incorporated into the operation. So not only do we progress the story by using their mechanic, but its a narrative reason to make it simple. Sly gets a disguise; The disguise itself, alongside in-game benefit Method of using; win a game of "Simon Says" by getting intel to answer a question Which not only is used for that minigame, but as Bently in the operation, when that "intel" is the inputs from Don Octavio! Its the same skill, just on the grand stage that is Sly 3s story. And combining 3+ of these, and you got yourself an operation! But the point against this way of having seemless hidden tutorial, falls flat on its face when they threw in the "Danger Room"

There's a lot of "well that doesn't make sense" in this kids game clearly intended to be an homage to cartoons. You have to buy into it a bit lol just like any game. Doom stops being a whole lotta fun when you try to apply realism where it doesn't belong. It's really a shame that so many of these critiques don't address that 99% of these bugs are because of the bad port done by Sanzaru of the trilogy. Not that they were bug free on PS2 but they were quite polished. The only thing that stands out is the hat binocucom bug which happens if you jump or fall into a mission trigger and is because it is capturing your character model from the last frame before the trigger and his hat is animated to bounce up off his head a bit while jumping Also, in no way is the first game's soundtrack superior to the atmosphere and tension generated by the 2nd's. In fact, there were several times they simply reused tracks in the original where in Sly 2 each hub world gets its own unique sound

So, any news on the Sly-tly short look at Bentley's Hackpack? 😉

There is ONE part of the Norwegian Dub (My first few playthroughs were in Norwegian) that I absolutely love; In the banter with Dimitri, instead of simply stating; "I have no idea what you're saying" the VA went; "Jeg skjønte ikke en meter av hva du sier" = "I didn't understand a meter of what you said" And I don't know why, but that line just made me laugh and I've held onto that for 20 years

Episode 5 still is my favorite one lol

so happy to have found extensive, high-quality reviews of games i grew up with as a child. thank you for the work you do!

Least this video is 12 hours long. I really hope that because this has done so well they re-release the second and third games. I can give or take Thieves in Time to be honest.

Cathedral is easily solvable through the power of running away/kiting and dropping dynamite. Parry button is more of a guessing game "use this whenever you see the enemy move 1 inch, hoping it will be an attack matching with the 3-4s windup" "Peak" game design right here. And the hook claw think can indefinitely stunlock garden knights, and frogs, pretty much every boss. Game's "puzzles" are honestly tasteless with the dpad bullshit, and bad camera tricks, making you not see paths or items due to perspective. It isn't even like zelda where you are playing a certain melody or sth. It's just random cryptic trivia that does not really lead to anything. I dropped the game for now because I genuinely felt like I was not getting any dopamine from playing well and being on my way to beat the game. And talking to any fan of this game gives me a brain aneurysm. I actually feel like I am going insane talking to a wall. Also regarding 36:28, do not feel bad for not wanting to do it the legit way, tunic fans (more like fanatics rather than fans) are so damaged in the head, that they themselves are saying that "the badly developed combat does not matter anyway, I only played it for the cryptic in-game booklet giving me nostalgia" Many of them turning down the difficulty the exact same way. You lost absolutely nothing of any "experience", since it revolved around just tool abuse, ranged magic wand for drones, slinger for stunlocking single enemies. Dynamite for oneshotting and groups. If you need more can always just farm money on the enemies in the cathedral. There is no way to beat it the "legit" way, your character does not have a zelda DS spin attack. So you have no aoe.

Thieves in Time even for all it's sins will still be my favourite one, because that's how i got introduced to the franchise.

It could have been brilliant but it almost seems deliberately designed to frustrate: sudden difficulty spikes that can entirely obstruct progress (e.g., that part in the West Gardens where suddenly you have to fight 2 and then 3 crocs at once; I died 3 or 4 dozen times getting through there); excessive use of entirely concealed passages necessary for progress (e.g., having to run behind an edge and then aggressively run into every inch of said edge just to make certain there aren't any hidden passages, over and over again, because now you know that the game relies on it as a mechanic); a handful of places where the save points are very poorly placed - I've run back to the Quarry from the starting Save Point 50 times, because one Save Point here is surrounded by a small moat of water, and the other is inactive. And now I'm stuck in Quarry running around the same territory over and over because I haven't found anything that seems to mark having "completed" the area, having already got the mask from Monastery. I found one loop back to the starting zone, but it's blocked by an envoy; so it's an entirely pointless connection right now as I have no means of killing them. All in all, a potentially great game marred by a collection of poor design decisions.

2:04:35 I never understood the community difficulty with this levels tank controls. Once you understand that the left stick moves the left side treds in a direction, and the right stick moves the right side treds either forward or back, it becomes relatively intuitive I thought. Up up goes, back back reverses, different directions for sharp turns, feather letting up one side for gradual turns. That's it! :D

Fantastic video friend. Excited to check out the next 3!

I enjoy the fact that all three members can pickpocket. There are risks and rewards with all three of them. Sly is the most proficient at it, but he needs to get up close to the guards, risking detection if the guard stops walking and Sly bumps into them. Bentley has the slowest method but it is the least prone to failure because of the extended reach of the magnet rod. Murray's is the fastest, but it will alert any nearby guards due to how loud it is.

Incredible video. Sincerely appreciate all the time you put into making this and providing such great gameplay footage. It was a pleasure to watch on the side with your excellent commentary.

Is this local co-op then? Just clarifying.

No offense, but your build is just rather terrible, and every complaint you had about the bosses and Stamina would have been resolved if you didn't have such a subpar build. If you're going for Technique you absolutely do NOT want to play with a 'Slightly Heavy' loadout. You want to keep your carry weight below 60% or if you can below 30% (it's doable, trust me). You also went overboard in Vitality and Technique in my opinion, both give severely diminishing returns after you reach 27 in each. Had you kept both at 27 and put most of those points in Capacity instead, you would have easily kept your carry weight below 60% or even 30%, and you'd have a much better time playing the game. You constantly run out of Stamina BECAUSE you have a 'Slightly Heavy' loadout. All your Stamina complaints would have vanished if you kept your loadout below 60%. What was it that Soulsborne fans say? Oh right: Skill issue.

2024 gamers: “Look at these outdated graphics! How old is this game?!” Sly Franchise: “Perfection has no age.”

You can fix the camera in the emulation settings. I couldn’t do that inverted camera

Some yt video name should you buy sly cooper. Bruh is that a question? If I see sly cooper, I buy the game no question ask, I have all the versions except the ps vita (I saw sly 4 have two file that needed to be downloaded on ps3, one the actual game and one the vita. I have no clue how the vita version work since I brought on ps store rather than the disk.)

Need Sly 2 and 3 too!