Time machine

A time machine is any device that allows the transferral of physical objects or information forward or backward in time using time travel. The technology that allows time travel was invented by Bentley with help from his then girlfriend Penelope, and was used to stop the destruction of the Thievius Raccoonus.

A necessary component of time travel is an object from the time period and location that the party wishes to travel to, which is used for carbon dating. This effectively disallows travel forward in time ahead of the present; however, when Bentley first states that he is building a time machine, he mentions that he is using it to find out what the future holds, suggesting that forward time travel was the initial intention.

Types
There are two types of time machine in the Sly Cooper series; those that move physical objects through time and space, and those that move information.


 * The Cooper Van was utilized by Bentley in a modified time machine design. The prototypical design was completed before his girlfriend Penelope went missing, but the design was later modified to fit into the Van. The Cooper Gang used the Van to travel through time and space, going as far back as 10,000 BC, and traveling to different locations on the earth from Japan to North America to Australia. The time machine could also be used to travel forward in time to allow the gang to return to the present. Though it is not actually witnessed, the time machine was originally created to travel to the future.


 * Le Paradox's blimp was a time machine built by Penelope with funding from Cyrille Le Paradox. While it was not the first time machine, it was the first time machine that was put to use. Le Paradox used the time machine to travel throughout time, aiding him in his plan to both validate his thieving skills by stealing the Cooper Clan's canes, and secure his future as a powerful ruler by forging royalty documents and hiding them in the past, to be found in the present. Inside the blimp was a time tunnel that Le Paradox planned on using to trap Sly Cooper and Inspector Carmelita Fox in an infinite loop through different time periods without sending the blimp through time with them. Sly ended up using the time tunnel to escape the blimp as it was being destroyed, and was sent back to ancient Egypt. How he caused the time tunnel to decide where he would go is unknown, though given his surprise at seeing a sphinx and the pyramids, it may have just been a random coincidence.


 * Bentley gave Dimitri Lousteau a "communication device" in the present that can send a holographic image of himself through time in order to communicate with Bentley and vice versa. The gang used this to locate when in time Le Paradox was interfering based on which section of the Thievius Raccoonus was disappearing.

Trivia

 * The time machines in the Sly Cooper series not only allow travel through time, but space. This is called "space-time travel."
 * In the real world, the theoretical device that sends signals or communications through time is called a "tachyonic antitelephone."