Techtite's Playstation-2 Reviews!

"If you merely glanced at the original game, this is the sequel to make you give this series a try."

---from the review

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Sly 2: Band of Thieves

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A Techtite Review

When Sly Cooper and the Thievus Racoonus first came out, it was definitely a cool little platform game, but without that little something extra to make him as well known as, say, Crash or Super Mario. This is the game that will --or really should-- change all that. Not only does the sequel, Sly 2: Band of Thieves, correct many little limitations of the prior game, it keeps piling more and more enhancements, until the resulting game is just one Spider-Man 2 away from the best time I've had on a video game system all year.

The game picks up where the prior game left off. To get the agnostic gamer up to speed: Sly is the youngest of a long legacy of thieving racoons. However; he's not a thief in the "rob from the poor to give to me" sense; he's more of a "rob from bad guys and end their evil plans" sense. In the original game, a band of evildoers called the Clockwork gang stole the pages of Sly's birthright; a book of special thief moves called the Thievus Racoonus. He got it back, and what's more, he kicked major butt of all the Clockwork Gang...particularly Clockwork, who was for all intent and purpose a giant clockwork bird.

At the onset of the game, the clockwork gang is disbanded, though they are using the mystical pieces of their old mechanical boss, Clockwork, for various evil schemes. These pieces of the evil Big Boss are filled with dangerous properties, however, so it is Sly's wish to steal the pieces, one by one, and ensure their destruction. On his tail is the omnipresent Officer Montoya Fox, who as this sequel elaborates, has hidden feelings for Sly, and he for her. However; she's an old school cop and he's a thief, so what's a cop to do?

The first sign of a great sequel is how all of your most important moves are not "forgotten" by Sly at the start of the sequel, only to find them later. OId-school players will be using old-school button combos very easily from the very start of the game. However; each level does still have around 20-30 secret code bottles, which when found, unlock a hidden safe in each level, to reveal yet another special move Sly can use. In short; they didn't mess with the interface of the game, which is good news, since it was already good.

Here's what they did improve: mission variety. The most obvious change is the way you have a secret hideout, which you can use to change your teammates. Sly is the master thief and handles all the serious sneaking around; Bentley is the brains, and handles all the more puzzle-savvy missions. Meanwhile, Murray is the brawn, entering each mission not unlike a bull in a china shop, though he's tough and can stomp on any enemy with ease. This is just a small taste of the wide expanse of new level variety and play styles at work here.

Here's where even more fun begins: Bentley's laptop computer in each hideout is logged into Thiefnet, allowing for two added treats. For one; all the coinage you collect from villains and the like, can now be used to buy a wide array of power ups for each character, like a super jump, an ability to activate a mini "glider" through the air, or sleep darts. Each character has their own power ups, whose potential new powers expand as the game progresses. What's even better; there are more power-ups than there are L1, L2, R2, and R1 buttons, so you can choose at any time in-game which of maybe two dozen possible power-ups are activated with which side button. This isn't even getting into the little vases and what-not that are hidden throughout each level, which if brought back to the hideout, can be sold via "thiefnet" for even more coinage. This is an awful lot of enhancements in the game, and we haven't even left the hideout yet!

Admittedly, a cynic will tell you that the missions aren't anything new, per se. Instead of finding keys, you're now finding Clockwork parts or secret plans or a computer or...whatever. However; there's a lot more ingenuity here than simply more-of-the-same. Few can deny that the addition of Bentley and Murray don't add to a lot more fun, particularly Bentley, where hacking into any enemy PC leads to a cool mini-game of sorts, of the classic shoot-em-up variety. Your little virus (or whatever) scoots through the innards of a PC, sort of like Tron, while the enemy virus programs and security systems chase you down. This is a really cute mini-game to add to the fun, and what's more, it's seamless; no additional load times required at all. It's also a salute to classic arcade games, and I always like that.

This game also improves the ongoing storyline. Montoya Fox is a much more prevalent fixture than in the first game, leading to one of many cute scenes, where Sly must work undercover to steal a Clockwork part to complete his mission. The problem; the part is suspended above a ballroom, where an elaborate ball is about to take place. Sly must dance with none other than the fair Montoya Fox, while in disguise, without breaking his cover. This is one of many cute missions in the game, since the characters are so "alive" here. Upon finding out that the man who just swept her off her feet is none other than Sly Cooper, Montoya Fox is even more upset...but is she upset at the theft, or more upset that she let her guard down, when wooed by the roguish Sly? The answer is alluded to in a cute finale, which spoilers notwithstanding, can be seen as both a conclusion to Sly's current tale, as well as an open door for a sequel. It winds up being pleasing for both these reasons.

It's often the little details that show how cool the coolest of cool games are. Do any online gamers have their headsets handy? Plug them in and boot up the game, turning on the "headset" option in the options menu. From then on, all communiqués to Sly from his teammates --and vice versa-- will be broadcast to your headset, as if you were actually inside the game. It's a little detail, and it only works for headset audio; so much so, I was almost inclined to list this little added feature only as a gray "sidebar." Regardless, it's one of those really cool added features that must've taken someone a lot of added time to program, and the game's fun factor is all the cooler for it.

Flaws? Not many. The last levels are a bit bizarre, but given that most such final levels in a platform game are some infernal leap frog over platforms floating in lava, I was at least thankful --spoilers notwithstanding-- the final levels are actually quite inspired and unique, and best of all, have no lava in sight (huzzah!). Speaking of challenges; at one point you are forced to play as Bentley alone, and due to his weaknesses, this was to this gamer the hardest level of the game, even compared to the final battle. I just felt like saying so in an obligatory "gripes" paragraph, given how short this paragraph is for this game.

However, these are minor grievances indeed. This is still one of the finest sequels to a game I've played for a long time. All your old friends return, and what's more, you get to play as two of them. Maybe in the inevitable sequel we'll get to play as Montoya Fox, with even more mission variety. Until then, we still get to play as three different characters, in a sequel with thrice the variety of its predecessor. Between Spider-Man 2 and this, it's been a great year on the Playstation-2, indeed. I know the upcoming array of holiday season games will make gaming even better, but given games like Sly 2 Band of Thieves, they have some hearty competition.

---Techtite