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#muggshot
slycooperconfessions · 6 months
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"Y'know in Sly 3 when you're Carmelita fighting Muggshot in Holland? Yeah, if you're on the bouncy cheese and kill him, in the next cutscene Carmelita is just bouncing up and down in the air. I can't do that fight without doing that glitch. It's so funny to me."
Confessed by: Anonymous
(I tried to find footage of this on YT to link to but couldn't' find any, but can confirm this is real because I did it once accidentally as a child and laughed so hard I cried. -Mod)
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yoitsgb · 6 months
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i couldn't resist drawing the humanization of muggshot...
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danscarf · 1 year
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Muggshot
Just Muggshot enjoying a "small mug" of coffee
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s0fthaunting · 1 year
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Muggshot, holding up a picture of the Cooper gang: Also, be on the lookout for these characters. I have a personal interest in seeing them rubbed out. So, I'm offering a free pizza party to the squad who bags 'em. And remember, that includes drinks and desserts.
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splazartj · 2 years
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Here's again the Sly Cooper Casting Showreel. I had some problems because I was using some lines from another project, but now it's alright. It's fixed.
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slylancey · 2 years
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I drew my characters from my favorite Video Game series of all time, Sly Cooper!
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cillysketches · 2 years
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[Day 21] Bad Dog
Mr. all arms, no leg day "Meat Head" Muggshot!
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whisker-biscuit · 11 months
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The Lines We Cross: Chapter 5
Last Call
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Cause you're a force of nature Look at what you've done I can taste the danger But I don't wanna run
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Muggshot’s hotel lobby was quiet. A few dogs lounged about on the center stairs, bored out of their minds but stuck on guard duty; the most excitement they’d seen in the last hour had been their boss hauling a cowed dalmatian out of the building before retreating back to his penthouse suit.
Then the front doors got busted in by the force of a single, powerful kick.
The guards all jumped up at once, but they had no time to react before the intruder made her first move. Inspector Fox shot three rapid electric bullets at point blank range and with pin-point accuracy. Her targets hit the ground almost simultaneously, and the lobby turned quiet once more.
Behind the cop who was now reloading her weapon, a raccoon carefully stepped over shattered wood as he made his way into the room. His eyes trailed up the stairway, falling upon the giant model of the bulldog’s face in all its self-centered glory where it had been built into the wall like a bulbous growth.
“Ugh.” Sly hated it. He wanted to rip that stupid cigar out of its mouth and then use it to burn the whole thing down. “Look at that ugly mug.”
“It is…certainly a very bold statement,” Inspector Fox replied with a wrinkled nose, not entirely knowing the reason for his disdain but obviously agreeing with it. “Even among all the egotistical types I’ve come across in the past.”
He made a face and turned to his left, where what used to be the hotel’s front reception desk now sat empty, devoid of practically every room key in the building. There was a noticeable closed-off cubby among the shelves behind the desk with a heavy-duty padlock keeping it shut.
“I think we found our secret way to the penthouse,” the raccoon said, gesturing to the spot.
She followed the direction of his hand and raised one eyebrow. Taking out the key they had gotten by the skin of their teeth, she walked around the side of the desk and carefully inserted it into the lock.
It turned with a loud click. The padlock came undone and she pulled open the rough wooden cover to reveal a remarkably shiny metal lever. The fox made a move as if to yank on it, then paused and drew her hand back cautiously.
“What if it’s a trap?” She stared at the lever as if it might grow teeth to bite her if she touched it. “That criminal could have said anything to make me let him go. It might be an alarm or something.”
“It’ll work.”
The cop shot him a look. “How can you be sure?”
“I just am.”
He met her gaze head-on, completely unfazed in the wake of her suspicious squinting. Let her try to crack through his poker face – she wasn't the first and she'd be as unsuccessful as all the others before her.
Then, as if taking his calm assertion as a challenge, she reached over and pulled the lever without breaking eye contact with him. There was a loud rumble and suddenly that giant bulldog face at the top of the stairs opened its mouth to reveal the promised secret elevator.
“Would you look at that,” Sly said coolly while Inspector Fox gaped. “Guess I was right and the dog wasn’t lying after all.”
“Yeah, well.” She closed her mouth and folded her arms in an obvious attempt to save face. “I suppose even criminals can tell the truth. Sometimes.”
He snorted, beginning to turn away. “Uh huh. Anyway, that should lead straight to Muggshot’s personal rooms. Now that you’ve got your straight path, you can wait for – what are you doing?”
The fox was heading up the stairs towards the open passage. She paused to look back at him with a raised eyebrow.
“What does it look like I’m doing? I’m going to apprehend Muggshot if he’s up there!”
“But – you –” Now it was the raccoon’s turn to gape. “Why? All you need to do to keep your job is lead your buddies straight to him, not try to take him down alone!”
“I risked this entire case and potentially the lives of my fellow officers. I can’t only do the bare minimum for reparations. If there’s a chance to apprehend such a dangerous individual with as few casualties as possible, I have to take it.”
She explained it so simply, so matter-of-factly, as if she was talking about writing a heartfelt apology letter instead of taking on the physically-strongest member of the Fiendish Five without backup or even a proper weapon. It was stupid, and foolish, and practically suicidal.
It made Sly angry.
“Are you sure it’s not just to show off to your boss so he doesn’t demote you?” He accused. “Trying to get all the glory before anyone else does to heal your wounded ego?”
The cop’s face pinched up in shock and anger, and he wondered with a touch of smugness if this was the first time a “civilian” had ever called her out.
She turned abruptly on her heel before he could dig that in, too. “Believe whatever you want. I’m going to confront Muggshot. Stay here where it's safe.”
Sly shook his head with a scoff. The blind, overconfident arrogance of this woman was on a whole other level. He should have known she was no different than the rest of them.
Inspector Fox stepped into the elevator, then turned to look at him one last time before the doors closed. He hadn’t moved an inch, watching her hold her head high like she was really about to make a difference.
The exact moment they disappeared from each other’s sight, the raccoon shot off like a rocket, taking the stairs two at a time as he started ascending the hotel floor by floor as high as he could go. “Stay here”, she’d said to a civilian. But Sly wasn’t a civilian, and he definitely wasn’t going to let this golden opportunity go to waste.
Technically, only the secret elevator could reach the top floor, but that was from inside the building. There were still windows up there, just as there were on every other floor, and Sly could see them as he climbed onto the outside ledge and craned his neck upwards. There was his old room in the same place he’d clocked it when he’d first come here with the cop, obvious by the bars Muggshot had installed the minute he’d settled on this being his base of operations. And two windows to the left of that, easily reachable with some careful scaling, was the mobster’s personal office.
Sly pulled his cane out of his backpack and extended it to its true length for the second time in one night. The Five had let him keep it all these years as a form of mockery, taunting him for his clumsiness with it, daring him to learn how to use it without any help from his father or his book. Daring him to impress them.
Well, here I go, assholes, he thought as he aimed the hooked end for the ledge above him in preparation for a jump.
 Eat your fucking hearts out.
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Carmelita wasn’t entirely sure what she’d been expecting when she reached the top floor. Piles of guns and cash everywhere, maybe, or more of the gangster’s imagery strewn about. What she hadn’t expected was to step into a large open room of what had probably once been a ballroom or club, expensive crystalline lamps scattered all across the purple carpet, and Muggshot himself sitting on a stolen plush chair on the other side of it all. She froze as they locked eyes, and her shock pistol was whipped out of her holster in an instant to aim up at him.
For his part, the bulldog looked just as surprised as she was.
“Wha?” He leaned forward in his chair, sounding completely bewildered. “My boys have been yapping about some big scary cop runnin’ around taking them down and, heh, and…and this is it? You’re the monkey wrench in my operation? Some scrawny chick with a pea shooter?”
The inspector inhaled, deep and steadying, and took a few steps forward. “Muggshot. You are under arrest. Put your hands up where I can see them and don’t make any sudden moves.”
Her free hand flashed her badge by the light of a nearby lamp. The mobster squinted at it, unbothered to even consider complying to her command.
“Ey, wait a second…I’ve seen that logo before.”
“I should hope so,” she snapped, quickly losing patience, “considering it belongs to me – Inspector Carmelita Fox.”
“Inspector? Wow. You’re with Interpol?” Muggshot leaned back again as if physically struck with offense. Still, his body language remained relaxed. “They really just let any average joe have a badge these days, huh?”
“Not just anyone – someone who is about to apprehend you for multiple instances of grand larceny, domestic terrorism, illegal gambling, and a whole other list of charges. Now, are you going to give yourself up?"
Now the bulldog finally tensed, but not in fear or worry. In fury.
“Wha-ha-ha-ha-what, are you kidding?” He stood up, staring her down, and she could see his raised hackles clear across the room. “You break into my place, attack my boys, trash the joint – I feel transgressed and violated!”
Carmelita tensed herself as he unholstered two huge, custom-made pistols.
“Let’s rock!”
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Muggshot’s private office was filled with a lot more paperwork than one might expect from the meathead mobster, but most of what was probably juicy evidence that would have Interpol salivating was completely ignored by Sly as he started sweeping aside papers and pulling open drawers. The bottom drawer of the desk was full of stacks of cash, and the raccoon poached a strap of twenties without even slowing down in his search.
When the desk proved fruitless for what he was really after, he moved ahead to the nearest bookshelf and began flipping through binders filled haphazardly to the brim with God knew what – tax evasions schemes and casino renovation plans, probably.
A booklet fell out between the pages of one such binder, hitting the floor with a solid enough sound to catch Sly’s attention. When he glanced downwards, his own face stared back.
It was the passport the Five had forged for him, back when they had still used public airlines to ferry him between them before Muggshot had eventually gotten his own private plane. Sly picked it up and quickly leafed through it; the expiration date wasn’t set for another two or so years, which meant it was something he could use. He pocketed it alongside the appropriated cash and kept moving.
Almost a minute had passed from when he’d started ransacking the room, and nothing was turning up. The raccoon could hear bullets flying from down the hall, and his fur prickled with the knowledge that any moment those sounds would stop and he’d be fully out of time. He needed to get out of here, but he couldn’t leave without finding what he was looking for, but he couldn’t find any hint of where –
His eyes alighted on a giant portrait of Muggshot’s mother hanging on the wall behind the desk chair. As if compelled by some ancient instinct, Sly made a beeline for the thing. He lifted the heavy metal frame with no small amount of difficulty and set it carefully aside, revealing a hidden safe embedded into the wall.
It would have been laughable to see one of the only things Muggshot had learned from Conner Cooper’s legacy being how he’d hidden the Thievius Raccoonus, if it weren’t even more infuriating. The raccoon gritted his teeth and clenched his cane tight in his hand a moment to dispel the familiar wave of rage threatening to cloud his mind. He could be angry later, when he had stolen his pages back and was safely out of Mesa. Right now, he just needed to focus.
It was a fairly standard wall safe with an old-fashioned dial lock. Sly spun it several times to wipe it, then pressed his ear against the safe’s side and placed careful fingers to the knob. He closed his eyes as he slowly began turning the dial to the right.
Tuning out the world around him to hear only the slightest clicking beneath was second-nature by now. Numbers were passed one by one in a careful, gradual method, oblivious to the time crunch he was on. Haste makes waste – and gets you wasted. Even after all this time, his father’s voice was a powerful echo in his head. An echo that was right, to boot. He couldn’t afford to rush these things.
The first number of the combination was hit with a nearly imperceptible click of inner gears. Sly stilled his hand, made sure he could still hear Muggshot’s gun going off, then started running the dial counterclockwise for the next one.
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A bullet whizzed through the air, cleaving the space Carmelita had occupied milliseconds ago as she ducked behind another crystal lamp. She didn’t know why the mobster had so many of these things, nor why they were bullet-proof, but she wasn’t about to question the only thing protecting her in this fight.
Halfway across the room, Muggshot growled when his shot missed, and began closing the distance between them way too quickly for someone his size. The inspector felt her heart pounding in her chest with every thump of his fists against the ground.
“You got a lotta nerve comin’ after a guy in his own home!” He hollered, firing again when she sprinted for more cover farther away. It ricocheted into the nearest window and shattered the glass into a thousand shards. “Ain’t there something in the cop rulebook about needin’ a warrant to do that?”
“Only if it was your rightfully owned property to begin with!” She couldn’t help yelling right back despite knowing that heckling criminals always made things worse. At least it gave her a little time to reload her own weapon as he sputtered and raged like an angry toddler.
Her original strategy when she’d come here was to intimidate Muggshot into surrendering quietly, and hitting him with a powerful shock or two if he refused. But he’d tanked four of her shots already without even flinching, and all it would take was one stray bullet from his end to put her down for the count. She was surviving on a mix of adrenaline, training, and pure dumb luck, and they both knew it.
Briefly she considered trying to flee for the elevator, to escape to the ground floor where it’d be easier to hide and snipe from an actually safe distance, but that idea was nixed as she remembered the raccoon waiting for her in the lobby. Even if she made it all the way down there unharmed, he didn’t have the instincts to survive a shootout, and she was not going to put the civilian she’d rescued in danger for a second time tonight.
Another bullet hissed just over her head. Inspector Fox took the cue to throw herself forward into a sprint for the next nearest lamp, aiming and firing her pistol wildly in his direction. The sounds of a grunt and electricity sparking against flesh weren’t very satisfying when it was followed by an almost literal hail of gunfire right on her heels.
She needed a new plan fast. There was only so much ammo she had on her, compared to Muggshot who seemed to pull spare bullets straight from thin air. Additionally, her breathing was labored, going on ragged, and at this rate it was only a matter of time before she was too slow to dodge a shot.
Rounding another crystal lamp - why were there so many lamps?! - Carmelita nearly tripped on something thin and long. It was an electrical wire attached to the base of the appliance, trailing out into the dark corners of the huge ballroom. Now that she had noticed, they were spread all across the floor, connected to every lamp and no doubt plugged into various outlets.
The lamps were all turned off, but if those outlets were live…
Muggshot growled, much closer than before, and there was no time to make a different decision. The inspector grabbed the wire, snapped it off the lamp, and jammed the newly-free end into the charge port of her shock pistol. She locked her jaw, steeled her nerves, and threw herself out in the open.
She could see the mobster react almost in slow motion – the bobbing of his head and the swivel of his body as he turned to aim both guns at her. But she had already been aiming when she’d jumped out from behind her cover, and those precious few seconds were all she needed to pull the trigger with Muggshot’s colossal chest directly in her crosshairs.
Her pistol lit up as if on fire, burning under her hand, and the kickback was enough to knock her flat on her back. She gasped for air as color exploded somewhere down in front of her, followed by a flickering of the chandelier above.
The fox lifted herself on one elbow just in time to watch Muggshot hit the floor like a sack of bricks. Smoke steamed lightly off his clothes and he twitched with electricity – then went still.
He was down for the count.
Carmelita heaved a sigh both relieved and exhausted, and let her head fall back against the carpet. She’d get up to properly disarm and restrain him in a second.
Right now, she just…needed a moment to catch her breath.
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They were in his hands. The pages were actually in his hands.
Sly crouched against the wall under the safe, overwhelmed with contradicting emotions as he stared down at the eight or so pages held between trembling fingers. They were crumpled, and stained, and torn violently at the edges, but they were here. Real. In his possession again.
His free hand came up to his mouth as nausea threatened to overwhelm him. He was ecstatic. He was spellbound. He was – he was –
 Eight years old and they’re tearing apart the book why are they doing that why isn’t dad getting up –
 Ten years old and they’re taunting you with it laughing at you saying you’ll never read those pages never be a real Cooper –
 Thirteen years old and gold eyes are staring you down and your chest hurts and let’s make a deal, Sly Cooper, you and I –
The lights suddenly flickered, startling him out of his head and into the real world again. Sly fumbled for his backpack, stuffing the pages as quickly but delicately into the front pocket as he could, and managed to stand on only slightly-shaking legs. The sound of bullets had stopped.
If there had ever been a sign that he was out of time, it was that.
Scaling back down the outer side of the building was a lot harder than going up, mostly because he was still on some terrible, wonderful high of elation and terror. The raccoon clambered back in through a lower-level window, then started a light jog down the stairway until he was on the first floor again. He could hear sirens somewhere in the distance. It was impossible to tell whether those were Muggshot’s goons sounding an alarm or the actual cops finally arriving to help their Interpol inspector.
Didn’t matter much either way when he was going to be long gone before they ever showed up.
Sly passed the bulldog’s giant head-elevator without a second glance, but he began to slow as he reached the lobby’s front desk where he’d been told to wait. He didn’t know why he stopped when his eyes landed on that lever, but he did.
She was probably long-dead. No one went toe-to-toe with Muggshot and came out the other end without several bullets in their chest. He’d seen it firsthand, too many times to count. Even so, the raccoon found himself standing there, looking up at the elevator entrance, as if waiting to confirm the outcome for some reason he couldn’t name.
Maybe it was because she was one of the few people who’d shown real kindness and respect to him in the last eleven years, even if it was under the false assumption that he wasn’t a criminal. Maybe it was because the realization still hadn’t quite sunk in that he was finally free, finally able to go where he wanted and do what he wanted without it being at the beck and call of someone else.
Maybe he was just morbidly curious.
Whatever the reason, Sly decided to wait a minute. Just one minute. Sixty seconds to count down and see if anyone would come out, and then he’d blast out of here.
With fifteen seconds left to spare, the elevator started rumbling. The raccoon’s heart leapt into his throat and he jumped over the lobby desk to hide behind it, peeking carefully over the counter as the lift came to a stop and the doors opened.
Sly stared, and couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
Out came Inspector Carmelita Fox, fully alive if not extremely worn-out, and without so much as a scratch on her body. She trudged down the shallow stairs and stopped only when she realized that her temporary ally wasn’t there to greet her. She lifted tired yet triumphant eyes to meet those of the raccoon who was still crouched behind the desk with his mouth agape.
“I did it, Ringtail,” she said, with an exhausted smile. “Muggshot’s reign over Mesa is no more.”
For the first time in years, Sly was at a loss for words.
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A/N: Aaaand that's the end of Muggshot! One down, four to go.
This was one of the first chapters I finalized months ago when I first started writing this fic out. It was really fun trying to merge the game's boss fight with how Carmelita would have to go about it, and how that might look like with just a tiny bit more realism.
Thanks again for reading!
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alphascorpiixx · 4 months
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Ignoring the fact that sly 1 takes place in 2002 I wonder what social media must be like in the sly cooper universe
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yoitsgb · 6 months
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fanon designes of my fav sly cooper villians!! redraw after a year…
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sodascribbles · 10 months
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two weeks of whump: day two
(read on ao3 here!) For @.promptsforyourwhumpfic's Two Weeks of Whump challenge! (not gonna clog your notifs with tagging you every day lol) Bio-weapon | Isolation Chamber | Needles Characters: Sly, The Contessa Content: panic attacks and flashbacks, trauma-induced claustrophobia, a lot of em dashes (i like them ok) Notes: i think the hole counts as an isolation chamber ??
It’s cold, dark, and he’s all alone. Somehow, it feels like the closet again.
He’s shoved down the stairs— he wouldn’t have willingly gone down them, not in a million years. The door slams shut behind him, heavy metal shuddering, trapping him in suffocating darkness.
Sly sucks in a shaken breath, immediately flinging himself to his feet. He can’t stay down here, he can’t, he can’t—
A slot on the door slides open. “Perhaps this will teach you some manners,” the Contessa chuckles, she chuckles, and the slot closes again. He chokes on a sob.
Now look, Sly Cooper isn’t afraid of the dark. He’s a master thief, he likes the dark, likes the safety and anonymity it provides. But this? This just feels like the closet again, the darkness pressing in and the walls much too close—
His breaths aren’t enough; the effort it takes to force them in and out is herculean and he’s still not getting enough air. The walls are closing in, crushing him, punching the next breath out of him and he can’t pull another one in he can’t breathe he’s gonna die here—
…Sly spends a long time panicking before he wears himself out.
It’s a lot bigger than the closet, and colder. He just has to keep telling himself that, or else he’ll lose himself in the memories again, every distant thud just Muggshot’s gun and every rats’ skitter just Clockwerk’s talons—
No. No, come on, Sly, breathe.
He can almost hear his brothers saying it to him, guiding him out of whatever (emotional or physical) dark place he’d been in that time, and Sly nearly bursts into tears again.
His brothers. He misses his brothers. He feels almost childish, admitting it, but Bentley could be dead in the jungle for all he knows, and Murray was here somewhere, hurting, and—
—and it was all his fault.
Sly sobs, sinking down to press against the cold stone.
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let’s rank the boss fight locations
this isn’t a ranking of the boss fights themselves, but, let’s be real, the location they take place in plays a major role in their quality and overall vibe. i’ll be looking at the locations of boss fights with the main baddies, and i’m gonna make a separate list for Sly 3′s secondary boss fights (like Tsao’s dragon, which might take place at the end of that episode but is still secondary because we have a boss fight with Tsao himself). let’s take a look:
15. Dimitri’s... Basement ?
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this was a mess from start to finish. so, from what i gather, we never got to see this boss fight’s full potential because of cut content? the area has 3 floors and you can explore the entirety of it during the boss fight (idk why SP neglected to put some invisible walls or something to block Sly from going upstairs), so it seems kinda lazy to just have the boss fight take place on the ground floor. it matches the fact that Dimitri’s “superpower” is never explained (which, as some of y’all explained to me a while back, is just him shooting lasers from his ring ???). overall, even if we disregard the “cut content”, it’s very underwhelming: a basement with jars of green goo? it’s giving tiktok star making slime during quarantine 2020
14. Cooper Vault Sanctum
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you’re telling me you had us explore the entire Cooper Vault, filled with traps, gadgets and puzzles, just to have the final boss fight take place at... what is it exactly? the wasted potential here is so annoying because imagine Dr Michael chasing Sly throughout the Vault as a prelude to the final fight, which could take place after ConnEr’s section. the awkward cut to Bentley and Murray’s mini boss fight feels misplaced and then we have Sly hiding under his ancestors’ vehicles ??? like for what? why??? it’s just a dull arena with a duller colour palette
13. Jennifer’s Body, dir. by Karyn Kusama (2009)
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this one’s weird. i doubt SP had any kinky intentions behind it but crawling up on Carmelita made me uncomfortable. Carmelarga is just one (bizarre) component, though: looking past the unintentional macrophilia, this area was used in the scorpion mission, which was really exhausting, so i don’t know why they chose to use it again. it’s really bland and i feel like it’d be much more interesting to have this take place at the fracking site where Sly and Murray’s mission took place. in terms of location, meh
12. Prague Rooftop
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the Contessa’s boss fight is pretty decent, especially once she starts using her hypnosis. the main issue with the location is how dark it is. i had to brighten up the screenshot above because of how little i could see. and i guess it could be argued that the darkness adds to her evasiveness during the fight, but even if that’s true, it takes place on a simple rooftop. it’s not by any means bad, but it’s a bit underwhelming considering she’s been such a threat for two episodes and then treated to no grandeur. both her levels are gothic masterpieces filled with secret rooms so i wish that was incorporated into her boss fight somehow
11. Raleigh’s Blimp/ Panda King’s Pagoda
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i’ve grouped these two together because i couldn’t decide which is better. i don’t have much to say here other than the locations reflect aspects of the characters but in the end they’re just boss fight arenas. they’re pretty, used in accordance with the bosses’ gimmicks but yeah, that’s it. average
10. ClockLa Sky Battle
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it’s not really serving final boss fight energy (especially because of the turret), but it’s very dramatic. this entry makes it into the top 10 because of the section where Sly has to save Bentley and Murray and everything is falling. that was pretty cool and matches the intensity of the scenario and ClockLa as a final boss. Sly 2′s boss fights benefit a lot from each country’s culture, nature and architecture adding some flavour, so i feel like this was cheated of that, but it’s also nice to have the game end where it begun
9. Plane Wing
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i’m not really fond of this boss fight because it’s (a) nonsensical, (b) anticlimactic, and (c) doesn’t fit in with the themes of the level which are otherwise greatly realised. but if we ignore all that and focus solely on its location, it’s great ! straight out of an action movie, truly. guards efficiently come out of the actual plane, as if they’re passengers, and it’s overall really dramatic
8. Jean Bison’s Sawmill
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now... normally this would land lower on the list because it’s just come crusty, dusty sawmill with a huge square arena reminiscent of a level from Sonic: The Fighters. and idk it’s bleak, kinda boring. b u t ... the excellent use of the location within the boss fight itself is cool. Bentley using his surroundings to destroy Jean Bison was pretty neat and fit in with the ‘brain v brawn’ theme (even though i fail to see how “brains” have anything to do with learning that pressing square drops logs and pressing circle lights a fire)
7. The Entire Fucking Hub
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just like with the Baron boss fight, i don’t particularly like this one. but the fact that you can mess around with Octavio because the boss fight takes place in the entire hub? A+ !!! girl every time i play this godforsaken section, i’m scaling the buildings, taking rides on the gondolas, trying to see if Octavio can keep up, it’s hilarious
6. Ship Mast
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a true feminist moment. there’s just something so ultra-masculine about pirates, which is a result of the modern world trying to capitalise on historical figures and moments through gender-based marketing. princesses for the girls and pirates for the boys. charming stuff honestly. anyway having “the boys” fight it out over Penelope and then in the end she herself does a Carmelita leap onto the mast, taking down the patriarchy one yard at a time? being restricted to just side movements was very refreshing, albeit a bit hard to get the hang of at the beginning, but they made it work. i’d love for SP to make more use of the severely underused main hub instead of having the entire boss fight take place on the ship, but as it is, it’s good
5. A Hole
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we all love a good hole. both The Black Chateau and A Starry Eyed Encounter have their climactic moments take place in a separate area to their hub, so this was such an interesting surprise. the boss fight location was literally in the hub’s centre the entire time, right under our noses. the walls are too high for Murray to climb and we’re trapped down there with Rajan who growls every opportunity he gets, like papi chill ok? it really gives the sense that there’s no escape, which matches the fact that after this fights, the overall plot transitions to its second act, its most dark. also, the circular shape of the location makes it similar to an arena, which goes nicely with Rajan taunting Murray over his strength. it’s reminiscent of Fight Club, especially once the guards start to jump in from above
4. Muggshot’s Hideout
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i’ll admit, this one ranked high because of personal bias brought on by extreme nostalgia, but the atmosphere is so good i couldn’t put put it lower. i’m aware of how bizarre some of its aspects are, like the huge glass shards (?) that literally emerge through the floor never being explained. maybe Muggshot collects fancy glassware, who knows. i’m choosing to give a pass to the fight’s first two sections because the final one more than makes up for it: we face off on a fucking chandelier. i mean, come on. if you really want me to defend this controversial choice, i’ll put my literature hat on and say that the interior here is so kitsch and try-hard fancy, with its purple carpet and crown-decorated mirrors, that it really shows how Muggshot might have tried to escape his upbringing by becoming some sort of... pimp ? but in the end wasn’t able to
3. A Literal Volcano
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a volcano lair feels synonymous with villainy, it’s just so dramatic, very Dr Evil. Clockwerk is truly the HBIC, dethroned by no one, and everything drowning in the lava in the background really makes this three-act boss fight one of the most iconic in the series. i love how in the final segment we have to traverse all the machinery and broken pieces to make it to Clockwerk, really forcing Sly to come into close contact with the lava
2. A Croc’s Head
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no boss fight encapsulates its level’s aesthetic as well as this. i don’t even know where to start with this one, it’s just so legendary: firstly, we start in a literal crocodile head, which tries to chew us. work. then, the three rooms we move through are decorated in the most demonic, voodoo way, with the side characters bopping around to the beat of the fight amidst the bones, chicken shit and ritualistic candles. like... what more do you want honestly
1. Tsao’s Sanctuary
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it’s giving ultimate boss fight. this was iconic from start to finish. we’re thrust into an extremely aggressive atmosphere, an ethereal but spiritually-charged hub with no surfaces to step onto, and given Contessa-level dialogue courtesy of Tsao’s conservatism and good ol’ delusion. this new type of gameplay isn’t hinted at beforehand and the player is stripped of any sense of security due to the fact that we can’t ride away or hide. we duel it out mid-air, before the second segment, which takes place in a seemingly endless bamboo forest, giving Tsao the perfect opportunity to showcase his set of magic attacks. 10/10
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Muggshot: okay smarty pants, What has Franch land ever brought us?
Sly: France invented democracy, Existentialism, and the ménage à trois.
Muggshot: Those are three pretty good things
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flimflix · 2 months
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Muggshot coming to end the Cooper bloodline
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blackautmedia · 7 months
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Sly Cooper: Bentley, Asylums, and Disability Representation in Video Games
Revisiting a Classic old series, we analyze the portrayal of Disability in the #SlyCooper series and how it portrays Bentley who uses a wheelchair as of Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves.
Some Excerpts:
There are two villains I want to discuss people might not think of in the context of disability--The Contessa and Arpeggio.
The Contessa's levels are my personal favorite in Sly 2, so anything I say here is with love but these ideas don't come in a vacuum. Aesthetically it's a mix of a prison level, a haunted ghost setting with mystical elements, and most importantly is an asylum drawing on a number of tropes surrounding the allure of a haunted asylum.
The next villain I want to talk about is Arpeggio. He runs into a common pitfall in that he's the disabled villain. He's an engineering parrot who cannot fly and seeks to reassemble Clockwerk's body to claim it as his own and achieve the immortality that comes with it. The important element is how Arpeggio's villainy is intrinsically linked with his body and his disability.
Oftentimes, able bodied writers will write a villainous disabled character where the concept of being disabled is so burdensome and awful to the eyes of an able-bodied audience that they will do anything and immediately jump to evil in order to not be disabled. You can see this in how a lot of the dialogue about or with Arpeggio reviles in how pathetic he is and how the story frames his inability to fly.
There was a promotional comic that came out as a midquel between the events of Sly 2 and 3.
Throughout all of Sly 2: Band of Thieves, things spiral badly out of control, the Cooper gang's plans fall apart, and they often have to improvise, barely succeeding in several of the levels and flat out failing in others. This game is a ride.
Many articles, discussions, and posts about Bentley as a disabled character often reinforce a harmful and ableist belief that he is a good disabled character because he is a genius able to engineer a solution that doesn't allow his disability to "slow him down." Whether explicitly mentioned or not, the discourse surrounding Bentley repeats this narrative in some way and falls into a line of trying to exceptionalize Bentley's actions.
Sly 3 does reserve its most overt ableism for its villainous characters in Don Octavio, Muggshot and Captain Lefwee. But scenes like this are still reliant on the helpless disabled person trope at Bentley's expense, where he's literally kicked to the ground and stripped of his autonomy to center the agency of an able bodied character.
The game doesn't try to act like Bentley can do better if he just pushes more and tries harder. There are things he can't do and it's frustrating, but they celebrate his strengths in what he does.
It doesn't tokenize his disability and the final villain has a confrontation with him entirely because of his relationship to the Cooper family, a fight that Bentley is initiating, not Dr. M.
If nothing else, I hope this video gave some food for thought regarding how a lot of disabled people are portrayed. I don't claim to be the arbiter of all things disability, but hopefully it'll give more insight into what games and media in general can do to improve in its storytelling.
It's a shame that the Sly movie or a TV series never came to fruition because it'd be a great opportunity to portray a disabled character, actually consult and include disabled people in the creative process and make something really memorable.
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