Thievius Raccoonus (game)

Thievius Raccoonus was a downloadable spin-off game created to promote the release of Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus in PAL regions, and was named after the book of the same name from the series. It appeared on the now defunct official European website for the game, www.slyschool.com, from when it first opened in February 2003. Tough the website is no longer available, it can still be viewed at The Web Archive. Because the website heavily relied on Adobe Flash, it does not work properly, and prevents the game from being downloaded.

The game was primarily created to be part of a competition, in which players who entered their high scores into the website's "Cooper Hall of Fame," were entered for a chance of winning four VIP passes to Disneyland Paris, as well as Sly Cooper-related merchandise. Both the game and competition were exclusive to PAL regions. The NTSC website had a different design entirely, and did not have the Flash game available for download.

Gameplay
Thievius Raccoonus was made up of a series minigames, and acted as a teaser for Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus. It came in the form of a book, some pages of which contained information on members of the Cooper Clan, Cooper-related abilities, and the basic storyline of the game.

Each of the five minigames involved Sly Cooper and his gang in a vehicle defending items, such as treasure chests, from enemies while also collecting a certain number of these items. Each minigame was based around one of the five episodes of Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus. Several were loosely adapted from sections of the game where Sly had to beat a large number of enemies in a vehicle before he could continue. Others were not adapted from any particular part of the game. As such, the game is not considered canon. Each time the player completed a minigame, they would be rewarded with a code, which at the time could be entered into a vault on the aforementioned website. For every vault code entered, the player was rewarded with a new page of the book or wallpaper. Initially, the player would be unable to do anything other than play the "Tide of Terror" minigame until they unlocked and downloaded page 10. As previously mentioned, as part of a competition, the player could also upload their high score to the website.
 * "Tide of Terror" - This minigame is influenced by "Treasure in the Depths." In a submarine, the player has to shoot 15 treasure chests before crabs manage to steal 15 of them.
 * "Sunset Snake Eyes" - This minigame doesn't parallel a moment from the game. Driving in the Cooper Van, the player must collect 20 bones before Walrus Guards do.
 * "Vicious Voodoo" - This minigame is loosely influenced by "Piranha Lake." The player must shoot 25 piranhas before Giant Mosquitoes manage to collect 25 of them.
 * "Fire in the Sky" - This minigame doesn't parallel a moment from the game. Driving the Cooper Van, the player has to collect 25 square objects before Mandrill guards get there first.
 * "The Cold Heart of Hate" - This minigame is influenced by "Burning Rubber." Driving the Cooper Van, the player must collect 30 televisions before the fire slugs do.

Characters
Sly and Murray are the only characters who make direct appearances, being playable in the minigames. They have no speaking roles. However, Bentley, Carmelita Fox, Conner Cooper and the Fiendish Five are all mentioned on collected pages of the book.

The book also mentions Sly's relatives, Rioichi Cooper, "Tennessee Kid" Cooper, Slytunkhamen Cooper and Otto van Cooper.

Trivia

 * This is the first and only Sly Cooper game to be released on PC.
 * The file's name is misspelled as "Thevius Raccoonus."
 * Similarly, Rioichi Cooper's name is incorrectly listed as Riorichi Cooper in the book.
 * Ashif Hakik's music from the first game is briefly re-used during the minigame segments.