sqlrob: (Default)
sqlrob ([personal profile] sqlrob) wrote2005-10-25 09:25 pm
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Game Review - Sly 2

Title:Sly Cooper 2 - Band of Thieves
Genre: 3D Platformer
Platform: PS2
Price Paid: $19.99
Would Pay: $39.99

This is, in one sentence, Ocean's Eleven as imagined by Chuck Jones. Because it's a game about thievery, it's by and large a sneaker. As indicated by my rating, it's still a good game despite my bias against sneakers. Everything has the exaggerated feel of a cartoon, making sneaking fun rather than a chore. Getting caught is seldom an issue, dying doesn't set you back very far. Rather annoyingly though, how much you get set back varies from mission to mission. Some missions set you back to the beginning of the mission, where others would drop you at the end of the previously completed section. There is no way to tell which is going to happen until you die.

This is one of those games that shows the rating is irrelevant to how fun the game is. It is an E (with one minor slip-up). It looks like a cartoon (even more so and is more "classic cartoon" than Zelda), but certainly should not be tossed aside by the discerning adult gamer.

[identity profile] tmpiper.livejournal.com 2005-10-26 05:17 am (UTC)(link)
I find sneakers fun but a little frustrating. Have you played the so-called Thief III yet? Just curious.

[identity profile] sqlrob.livejournal.com 2005-10-26 12:51 pm (UTC)(link)
I was never that big a fan of the Thief series. I've tried to play the first one a couple of times, but the furthest I ever made it was the point that what you tried to steal told you to steal it.

It's difficult for me to do PC gaming now, so I haven't gone back in years.

[identity profile] sqlrob.livejournal.com 2005-10-26 01:55 pm (UTC)(link)
OK, now that I'm awake a little more, some further exposition.

Sly takes the frustrating out of that fun but frustrating part of sneakers. You know the old Bugs Bunny cartoons where Bugs is behind Fudd, matching him step for step (with a doodoo doo noise), Fudd turns around and nobody is there because Bugs flipped with him, then finds out when he's tapped on the shoulder? Well, you can do that (and do it frequently, well, replace "tapped on the shoulder" with "killed"). Or run across the power lines with the guards oblivious below you; you're a raccoon after all.

This game is about as far from realistic as you can get with a sneaker, and I think that's what I like about it. I don't care about making things even close to realistic. And despite the supernatural overtones of Thief, it's a heck of a lot closer to realism than Sly is. There's no real worry about dying and having to save your game, you could theoretically do the game in one shot, provided of course you have the time for 8 two and half to four and a half hour levels. No "fuck, I screwed that up, time to load" moments at all. I guess I've just lost my patience with frustrating games as I've aged.