• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time |OT| Sly & the Family’s Tome are Back!

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
I wonder how much this game cost. I think it's really gorgeous. 60 fps and nice art goes so far...
 
On thate not it should be noted that
Carmelita has no lone jobs, so you never have to pick her from the hideout
.

I wonder how much this game cost. I think it's really gorgeous. 60 fps and nice art goes so far...

Something tells me the game's budget wasn't that much bigger than PlayStation All-Stars; the main reason the series did so well was because they were pretty cheap to produce.
 

Camjo-Z

Member
I was seeing if anyone posted treasure locations online (don't judge me!!) and came across this hilarious video I completely forgot about... if there is anyone here that likes Sly and has not heard it yet... you need to.

The Cooper Gang Robs KFC
 
Sorry if they've been asked before, but I just have a couple of questions on collectables.

- I've seen masks appear in certain jobs; are there any other collectables that can only be found in job locations, or is everything else in the hub worlds?

-Is there any way to see if you've collected all the masks in a job location (like inside the prison in the first world?) I know the bottles do a good job of telling how many you have left to find in a certain location, but haven't seen anything similar for masks.
 
I was seeing if anyone posted treasure locations online (don't judge me!!) and came across this hilarious video I completely forgot about... if there is anyone here that likes Sly and has not heard it yet... you need to.

The Cooper Gang Robs KFC

Totally forgot about that sketch; there's another one where Sly frees Red from The Shawshank Redemption.

An on that topic, Sly has a podcast where he talks about video games with his comedian friend; latest episode is about (suprise) Sly 4.

Sorry if they've been asked before, but I just have a couple of questions on collectables.

- I've seen masks appear in certain jobs; are there any other collectables that can only be found in job locations, or is everything else in the hub worlds?

-Is there any way to see if you've collected all the masks in a job location (like inside the prison in the first world?) I know the bottles do a good job of telling how many you have left to find in a certain location, but haven't seen anything similar for masks.

1. Nope, just masks.

2. Hit select and go to Status to see what you've collected thus far.
 

Ridley327

Member
Sorry if they've been asked before, but I just have a couple of questions on collectables.

- I've seen masks appear in certain jobs; are there any other collectables that can only be found in job locations, or is everything else in the hub worlds?

-Is there any way to see if you've collected all the masks in a job location (like inside the prison in the first world?) I know the bottles do a good job of telling how many you have left to find in a certain location, but haven't seen anything similar for masks.

-Masks are the only collectibles that pop up in the non-hub levels.

-Yes; press Select to bring up the map, and move over to Status, which will give you a tally of all the treasures/clue bottles/masks that you have found in that time period. Unfortunately, there isn't much more detail than that, so you kinda have to futz around with the mission replay function to see which level you didn't get all of the masks on. This is why it's a good idea to use the AR Treasures feature on the Vita in conjunction with the PS3 game, since it will show where they're at.
 
Sorry if they've been asked before, but I just have a couple of questions on collectables.

- I've seen masks appear in certain jobs; are there any other collectables that can only be found in job locations, or is everything else in the hub worlds?

-Is there any way to see if you've collected all the masks in a job location (like inside the prison in the first world?) I know the bottles do a good job of telling how many you have left to find in a certain location, but haven't seen anything similar for masks.

I've gotten all the treasures and bottles in the first world; none of them were inside, so I believe it's only the masks/emblems that are found during missions. Don't know if there's any way to keep track of emblems per location/mission though. You just have to scour each area.
 

Berordn

Member
Nah, they werent. They play pretty much the same as they do now as they did then. Mission distribution is similar as well, aside from world 4 when Bentley is stuck on his own for a while.

They really didn't, though. Everything was pretty rough around the edges in Sly 2, and you did mostly play as Sly, but Bentley and Murray just felt half-baked. It added some much needed variety to the gameplay, but things like the hacking minigames and the random stuff you ended up doing toward the end of the game really bogged it down. Then Sly 3 rolls around and removes almost all of the platforming, once you get to Holland you're rarely playing as Sly, and most of the missions you do with him end up being "get him to this point so that we can shove RC nonsense down your throat."

In 2 and 3 Bentley and Murray really were clunky. Their baseline moves were pretty lackluster and under-powered, especially in the case of Murray who had no stealth options available to him, but still couldn't go face to face against the big guards without losing most of his health. Bentley was at least brought up to par with Sly with his sleep darts and his triple jump in 3, but it was still disappointing having to play as him. They did get some useful tools with the gadget grid, but having to juggle everything around with that also got tiring really fast, since you often had to switch things around based on your surroundings and what you were fighting, and hitting select to remap everything broke into the action.

Which is all alleviated in Sly 4. The few minigames there are don't overstay their welcome, and with half of the playable characters being nearly identical to Sly's gameplay, it doesn't feel like it's randomly introducing new elements to the gameplay to detract from the main draw, it just emphasizes different abilities he already has. The removal of the gadget grid is probably the best thing Sanzaru did with the game, and the way things like Murray's Fists of Fire work now really helps keep the character fun to play without having to search for health every time I accidentally get caught in something's sights.

And I say this as someone that likes the trilogy, but Sly 2 and 3 were seriously flawed. Sanzaru's done something great with the franchise by just removing the bullshit, which makes me wonder what Sucker Punch was doing before.
 
1. Nope, just masks.

2. Hit select and go to Status to see what you've collected thus far.

-Masks are the only collectibles that pop up in the non-hub levels.

-Yes; press Select to bring up the map, and move over to Status, which will give you a tally of all the treasures/clue bottles/masks that you have found in that time period. Unfortunately, there isn't much more detail than that, so you kinda have to futz around with the mission replay function to see which level you didn't get all of the masks on. This is why it's a good idea to use the AR Treasures feature on the Vita in conjunction with the PS3 game, since it will show where they're at.

I've gotten all the treasures and bottles in the first world; none of them were inside, so I believe it's only the masks/emblems that are found during missions. Don't know if there's any way to keep track of emblems per location/mission though. You just have to scour each area.

Thanks everyone! I forgot about the status button, despite the fact that I remember getting annoyed that it wasn't touch enabled on the Vita. Unfortunately, I don't have a PS3, so I'll just have to do some good old fashioned collectable hunting. The status will still save a ton of time though.
 

Grisby

Member
Yes, you can. The only characters you need for bottles and Cooper emblems are Sly and his ancestor for that world. I think all of the bottles can be acquired by Sly using disguises and I think at least one emblem for each world needs the ancestor.
Cool. Thanks man.
 

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
Kinda can't play the Vita version after playing the PS3 one. 60 fps + gorgeousness vs. 30 fps and flatter everything. I dunno. I wish I was playing the PS3 version all the time...
 
Yeesh, the game feels like it's trying hard to keep a steady FPS in Episode 3.

I'm still having a great time, though.
Bob's training montage
in episode 3 went on for waaaayyy too long.

I was seeing if anyone posted treasure locations online (don't judge me!!) and came across this hilarious video I completely forgot about... if there is anyone here that likes Sly and has not heard it yet... you need to.

The Cooper Gang Robs KFC
what the hell, why am i laughing so hard
 

VanWinkle

Member
Yeesh, the game feels like it's trying hard to keep a steady FPS in Episode 3.

I'm still having a great time, though.
Bob's training montage
in episode 3 went on for waaaayyy too long.


what the hell, why am i laughing so hard

On Vita? Cause I agree it does have some framerate problems on the Vita version in episode 3. But man, that episode is just so darn beautiful. Wish they would have optimized the engine more; probably could have got more out of the Vita version, too. I don't think they needed to halve the framerate AND take out a lot of the visual effects. I do appreciate the native res for sure, though. I just feel like the Vita version COULD have looked better I think.
 
On Vita? Cause I agree it does have some framerate problems on the Vita version in episode 3. But man, that episode is just so darn beautiful. Wish they would have optimized the engine more; probably could have got more out of the Vita version, too. I don't think they needed to halve the framerate AND take out a lot of the visual effects. I do appreciate the native res for sure, though. I just feel like the Vita version COULD have looked better I think.
I was mainly talking PS3. It drops a bit during some small(albeit rare) instances. I don't mind it, however, since that level is reeeally good looking. I'm glad they didn't show anything from it off in videos or promotional material before release. I'll try it out on the Vita later.

But speaking of the Vita version, the draw distance is pretty bad... it's awesome that it's on this thing, but it seems like the performance took a massive beating during the porting. Still fun, though!
 

VanWinkle

Member
I was mainly talking PS3. It drops a bit during some small(albeit rare) instances. I don't mind it, however, since that level is reeeally good looking. I'm glad they didn't show anything from it off in videos or promotional material before release. I'll try it out on the Vita later.

But speaking of the Vita version, the draw distance is pretty bad... it's awesome that it's on this thing, but it seems like the performance took a massive beating during the porting. Still fun, though!

I actually thought that the draw distance and texture quality were the main things that were carried over well, but I guess I haven't looked enough into it.
 
I actually thought that the draw distance and texture quality were the main things that were carried over well, but I guess I haven't looked enough into it.
It might be worse in certain spots? In Episode 2, I was only about a foot/2 feet away from a building and it was translucent. A few more steps back and it was gone. I do love the textures on the Vita version, so I'll give you that.
 

Globox_82

Banned
I am so afraid that this will flop and we will never see Sly 5 :(
Game couldn't have had big budget. I hope it was not more then 5-10 million usd
 
Loving this game so much. Between Sly Cooper 4 and Ni no Kuni, my gaming is filled with an over abundance of quirky humor and charm, quite the welcomed departure from the Far Cry 3 and Dishonored I recently played lol.
 
Picked this up today on PS3, downloaded it on the Vita and haven't touched the PS3 disc since. It's a solid effort in my opinion, really, but aside from the increased number of enemies and longer draw distances, it really isn't something that couldn't have been done on the PS2.

With that said, it's much more impressive on a handheld than on the big screen.
 

DjRoomba

Banned
I want to like this because there isn't enough games like this, but it seemed entirely mediocre from the demo. Seems like a pretty simple kids game with pretty unfunny childish dialogue/story too.
 

VanWinkle

Member
Picked this up today on PS3, downloaded it on the Vita and haven't touched the PS3 disc since. It's a solid effort in my opinion, really, but aside from the increased number of enemies and longer draw distances, it really isn't something that couldn't have been done on the PS2.

With that said, it's much more impressive on a handheld than on the big screen.

I very much disagree with you. I just got done playing a little bit of Sly 3, and the difference is DRASTIC.

By the way, here's a small comparison between the PS3 and Vita versions in the episode 3 hub world. Only view if you have already got to that point or you don't really care what the world environments are. Differences in color are because one is direct feed (Vita), and one is a camera shot (PS3).

PS3
Vita

PS3
Vita

Can definitely see the lighting effects drawback on the Vita:
PS3
Vita

And the decrease in draw distance (as you said Grim: I compared it more and it definitely is quite a bit worse):
PS3
Vita

Overall the Vita version does still look great.
 

Berordn

Member
So I just beat it, and saw the
kinda depressing ending
. Everyone's been talking about
some special episode with Carmelita, what do I have to do to get that?
I've still got lots of treasures and trophies to get so I guess I'm still working on that anyway.

Picked this up today on PS3, downloaded it on the Vita and haven't touched the PS3 disc since. It's a solid effort in my opinion, really, but aside from the increased number of enemies and longer draw distances, it really isn't something that couldn't have been done on the PS2.

With that said, it's much more impressive on a handheld than on the big screen.

So aside from all the stuff that you couldn't do on the PS2, you could do it on the PS2.
 
So aside from all the stuff that you couldn't do on the PS2, you could do it on the PS2.

Well, I think more enemies and longer draw distances aren't really necessary for a Sly game. Assassin's Creed, for instance, would not work well on the PS2, as evidenced by the really dull and stripped down AC:Bloodlines on the PSP.

If they cut back on details in Sly 4 it to make it run on the PS2 it wouldn't be so drastically different.

My original point was, the game seems to be somewhere between PS2 and PS3 levels graphically, precisely where the Vita is, which is why it looks much more impressive on the handheld.
 

Berordn

Member
Well, considering most of the appeal of the new entry are that the areas are gigantic and you don't miss a beat, and that there's more stuff packed into the world than ever before, I would say it is kinda important for the game. And I do personally think that having the game running at 60 FPS with the constant cel-shading effects going on pushes it far past PS2 territory, and it makes the game seem buttery smooth.
 
Yeesh, the game feels like it's trying hard to keep a steady FPS in Episode 3.

I'm still having a great time, though.
Bob's training montage
in episode 3 went on for waaaayyy too long.

And I went for the trophy for that montage. After the rehashed 6 minigames during all that montage music, I thought it was finally over, but no! They threw in MORE of those same minigames in random order with random quantity of times you need to complete them!

Took me several tries and lots of swearing, but I got it.
 

VanWinkle

Member
Well, I think more enemies and longer draw distances aren't really necessary for a Sly game. Assassin's Creed, for instance, would not work well on the PS2, as evidenced by the really dull and stripped down AC:Bloodlines on the PSP.

If they cut back on details in Sly 4 it to make it run on the PS2 it wouldn't be so drastically different.

My original point was, the game seems to be somewhere between PS2 and PS3 levels graphically, precisely where the Vita is, which is why it looks much more impressive on the handheld.

I don't think you're remembering well enough what the PS2 Sly games looked like. I played them back to back and the difference in easily a generation.
 

Stellares

Member
I just finished it. Overall it was ok, but I'm a little disappointed.
Way too many mini games and not enough solid platforming. The actual platforming was far too focused on the gimmicks of each ancestor/costume and just didn't hold a candle to Sly 1.
I hated the Bentley's hacking segments and they seemed to occur every five minutes in this game.
The first few worlds were enjoyable, but it soon got repetitive and by level 4 I wanted it to be over. It was towards the end that the game also fell in quality. Level 5 was both short and rather "meh". The platforming at the end
with all the ancestors at once
was completely banal and I just wanted to get to the next part.
The end boss was an utter joke.

The levels, while much larger than those in Sly 2 and 3, where unnecessarily large. The extra size is only used to pad it full of collectibles and treasures. It just becomes harder to navigate and find clue bottles. I don't particularly feel an urge to get 100% on this game with all the weird locations of sly masks and the time it would take. I did get 100% on the first three games however. The actual mission lengths remain about the same as the original games.

I hope I'm not alone in feeling that each boss was far too silly and unformidable. There was no short of silliness in the original games, but somehow I felt at least that I could take the enemies seriously. Mugshot, Panda King, Rajan,The Contessa,Jean Bison and Clockwerk were all great bosses in terms of the fear they can create, while still keeping it light and kid friendly. Not to mention the wonderful atmosphere in the viscious voodoo level in the first game. Each time I encountered a boss in this game, I don't particularly get a feeling that the boss fight is going to be challenging at all.
La Paradox
makes a poor villain.

I was also let down with the story. They had huge potential with this, and they wasted it. I wanted at least an acknowledgement of Sly's parents or something a little more complex than what actually happened. I predicted the "twist" pretty early on. The time travel mechanic was merely an excuse for the different environments and ancestors. A story felt slapped on it afterwards. Additionally, the ancestor's did not feel very inspired.


On the bright side, the game is beautiful. I really enjoyed the art style, if some character designs were a little too detailed for my tastes. Unfortunately my ps3 had several frame rate issues with the game, but it held up most of the time. Additionally, when there were many platforming areas that were done very well and reminded me of the older games. I feel like this all could be improved for the next Sly. I hope it will happen.

For reference, I loved Sly 1 and 2. I felt that Sly 3 was the lowest point in the series. I rank this higher than Sly 3 but it doesn't match the first two games. I do not rate it as low as Adam Sessler, but his review was spot on in many respects.
 
I don't think you're remembering well enough what the PS2 Sly games looked like. I played them back to back and the difference in easily a generation.

I dunno, I was watching a video of Sly 3 today and aside from the Hub levels, it looked very similar.

But okay, Sly 4 looks better than the Ps2 titles, and like an early 2006-2007 PS3 game. Having said that I'm going to stick my neck out and say that I think Ratchet and Clank: Tools of Destruction is the better looking next-gen (current?) sequel to a classic Sony PS2 platformer.
 

VanWinkle

Member
I dunno, I was watching a video of Sly 3 today and aside from the Hub levels, it looked very similar.

But okay, Sly 4 looks better than the Ps2 titles, and like an early 2006-2007 PS3 game. Having said that I'm going to stick my neck out and say that I think Ratchet and Clank: Tools of Destruction is the better looking next-gen (current?) sequel to a classic Sony PS2 platformer.

Respectfully disagree. Sly 4 has better lighting, more detailed textures, better image quality, and self-shadowing (which ToD lacked). To be fair, most of those apply to the PS3 version, not the Vita version. And I do get that you might just find the art style of R&C more appealing than Sly. Technically, though, it's no contest that Sly 4 is better.
 
I'm shocked that there are people saying that it looks no better than the old games :/

yPeAyhu.jpg
 

Tagg9

Member
I dunno, I was watching a video of Sly 3 today and aside from the Hub levels, it looked very similar.

But okay, Sly 4 looks better than the Ps2 titles, and like an early 2006-2007 PS3 game. Having said that I'm going to stick my neck out and say that I think Ratchet and Clank: Tools of Destruction is the better looking next-gen (current?) sequel to a classic Sony PS2 platformer.

I would have agreed with you based on the promotional screenshots, but having played through the game I am honestly stunned with how well the visuals turned out. Great textures and lighting, and the actual animations are noticeably better than prior games.

Having said that, I wouldn't necessarily argue that it looks better than R&C: ToD. The two games are very different visually.
 
I would have agreed with you based on the promotional screenshots, but having played through the game I am honestly stunned with how well the visuals turned out. Great textures and lighting, and the actual animations are noticeably better than prior games.

Having said that, I wouldn't necessarily argue that it looks better than R&C: ToD. The two games are very different visually.

Perhaps you may be right, I haven't seen the later levels yet, but at least japan did not look very impressive.

I'll post my thoughts when I've finished the game if my opinion changes.
 

Berordn

Member
Cool, I haven't played much yet and all I've seen is the loading screens which show full game totals only.

It's not terribly useful for the masks, since nothing tells you how many are in the missions or overworld, but it'll at least let you know how many are left.
 
Top Bottom