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Sly Cooper 3: Honor Among Thieves

Score: 98%
ESRB: Everyone 10+
Publisher: Sony Interactive Entertainment America
Developer: Sucker Punch
Media: DVD/1
Players: 1 - 2
Genre: Platformer (3D)/ Action/ Stealth


Graphics & Sound:

Sly Cooper 3: Honor Among Thieves continues the story of everyone's favorite furry thief. Not only does Sly 3 continue the story, but it also continues the line's cartoon-styled graphics, sarcastic characters and all around fun.

Each character and location looks just as good as they have in the past, if not better. Sly, Carmelita, Bentley and Murray all come across just as sleek and stylish as they ever have. The free-roaming worlds are also large and full of detail. Each location has lots of roadways and rooftops to explore and exploit as you look for guards to loot (as well as your next mission).

The sound effects and music also come off just as well, as in the previous games. Each voice actor once again does a good job continuing the story or providing banter and other in-game commentary that gets neither repetitive nor old, which is always a good thing. The game's music is also fun to listen to and will either speed up as you race away from guards or slow down and get quiet as you sneak through the shadows.


Gameplay:

Sly Cooper 3: Honor Among Thieves follows Sly's quest to reclaim a birthright that has been passed down through the Cooper family for generations. He has learned from an old friend of his father's that the Cooper family has been stowing their stash in a mountain vault that is now under the possession of a deranged scientist-baboon.

Sly and one of his best friends, Bentley, must gather a crack team of thieves to steal back what is rightly his. The game takes you across the world from Venice to Australia as you collect people that each have their own strengths. The first stop is to find and win back the lost third member of the Team Cooper, Murray. Murray left after the events of Sly 2: Band of Thieves when he felt responsible for Bentley's injuries that now have the explosive-expert turtle wheelchair-bound.

Besides Murray, you will collect his aboriginal mentor from the outback, and two or three other characters. Each of these characters has one or more unique gifts that make them a great and necessary asset to Cooper's plan to retake the vault. These abilities range from pure strength, to the ability to turn into rocks and trees in order to hide from guards, to laying bombs that can lay waste to baddies in your path.

Cooper's path to reclaim his rightful wealth will be full of a wide variety of missions. Not only will you have to sneak your way through cities collecting booty or cracking safes, but will also have to pilot boats down the Venetian canals, fly fighter-planes over farmlands and take pictures of crime lords as they do dastardly deeds.

Each episode also contains at least one mission that can be viewed using 3D-glasses (included) for added effect. The use of these glasses is an interesting effect. Typically these missions involve you weaving through laser beams, crawling through rotating cork-screws or walking through leaky steam pipes. With the glasses on, there is a noticeable difference and the 3D effect is quite apparent. If you decide to take the glasses off, you can either carry on with the screen like it is (really it looks normal with the colors slightly off), or you can restart the mission without the 3D effects and it looks like any other mission.

Honor Among Thieves also has several multiplayer modes. Cops & Robbers puts one player in the role of Sly while the other controls the foxy copper, Carmelita. The two of you race around town while Sly collects goods and Carmelita tries to stop him. Co-Op mode has two players working together to break into a security system and fight enemy after enemy as you work your way to the exit. Biplane Mode has Sly and Carmelita taking to the airways to see who can rack up 10 kills first. Pirate Battle lets you control either Sly or Bentley as you steer and repair your ship trying to sink your opponent's boat three times.


Difficulty:

Sly Cooper 3: Honor Among Thieves is a fairly easy game. That isn't to say it isn't fun -- just something you can make constant headway in. There were a few missions that I had to repeat several times but since there is no "Game Over", I never felt like I was really punished in any way when the person I was spying on saw me or I fell into the water one time too many. In general, you should be able to knock out an episode every one to two hours, giving you 15 - 18 hours of non-stop fun. That doesn't count the multiplayer modes, of course.

Game Mechanics:

Sly Cooper 3: Honor Among Thieves has a plethora of characters that each have their own control scheme. But, in general, they all fit the same basic pattern. You perform a basic attack (be it swinging your cane, your fists, or your wheelchair) with the Square button, and execute a more powerful attack with either the Triangle or a combination of the Square and Triangle buttons. You jump with the X button and look for Way-points (where you need to go next) with the L3 button (you know, clicking the Left Analog stick).

Honor Among Thieves is a must buy for fans of the series or action-platformers. Not only do you get to play with all of your favorite critters, but there are even a few new characters to play as. The game's continuing story line and fun multiplayer games will keep you entertained for hours.


-J.R. Nip, GameVortex Communications
AKA Chris Meyer

Sony PlayStation 2 Nascar 06: Total Team Control Windows Nibiru

 
Game Vortex :: PSIllustrated