[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/sly4.png]]
[[caption-width-right:300:[[StealthPun It's]] [[SequelGap about]] [[TimeTravel time!]] ]]

The fourth game in the ''Franchise/SlyCooper'' series, and the first not to be done by Creator/SuckerPunch. Instead it was done by Creator/SanzaruGames, who were the head of the ''Sly Collection'' (a HD port of the original trilogy).

A return to the series after an eight year hiatus. Set somewhere after the events of ''[[VideoGame/Sly3HonorAmongThieves Honor Among Thieves]]'', Sly and the gang reunite when the pages of the Thievius Raccoonus start to go blank. Someone's messing with the timeline and targeting the Cooper clan. The gang, armed with a time machine, intends to find out who and stop them.

The game is notable for having a ''very'' controversial PlotTwist and ending, so beware of spoilers.
----
!!Bentley-san, though the bamboo forest is dense, tropes flow through it without effort:
* AnachronismStew:
** Noted in Chapter 3. While mostly subverted with what Sly [[spoiler:and Le Paradox's forces]] brought along to the past, the Ice Age apparently was noted to occur merely ''thousands'' of years before the present as opposed to millions; dinosaurs were still alive; and upon first glance in the hubworld, the natives already knew how to write long before the first documented scripts from Ancient Egypt.
** Some of the collectible treasures screw around with this, too, presumably justified by time travel shenanigans, or else things that did not exist show up hundreds and thousands of years before they should. In the Ice Age, you can find "Slytunkhamen's Vase." How it existed thousands of years before said Cooper was born is just plain baffling. In Cotton Mouth Bluff, you can find Muggshot's Coin, the last remnant of his Mesa City empire... before said empire even existed. In Ancient Arabia, you can find Puffin's Cookie Jar, which is stated to be the one Sly, Bentley, and Murray stole when they were at the orphanage, 1,000 ''years'' before they were even born. Was the cookie jar passed down for that long?
** Bentley states that Henriette Cooper, Sly's pirate ancestor, found Sinbad's hoard of treasure in 1616. In real life, however, UsefulNotes/TheGoldenAgeOfPiracy didn't begin until the [=1650s=] and lasted until the mid-[=1720s=]. Going by how elements people most associate with {{pirates}} such as the Jolly Roger flag were most prominent in the early eighteenth century, it would've made more sense for ''17''16 to be the year she found Sinbad's hoard instead.
* ArabianNightsDays: "40 Thieves", which takes place in Ancient Arabia.
* ArtShift: The interlude cutscenes often swap between all sorts of art styles (usually when a Cooper ancestor recalls how they ended up foiled by the resident villain), including crayons, cave paintings, and traditional animation.
* BadBoss: Toothpick, who shoots one of his mooks by accident and threatens another mook when he tells Toothpick to watch where he is pointing his weapon. To say nothing of [[KickTheDog cutting their benefits]] and forcing them to work overtime.
* BadassInDistress: Sly, Bentley, and Murray are captured by Toothpick at one point in "Go West, Young Raccoon." The trio are eventually saved by Carmelita Fox and "Tennessee Kid" Cooper. Carmelita previously gets kidnapped this way and gets saved by Tennessee.
* BittersweetEnding: More "bitter" than "sweet"; [[spoiler:Le Paradox and his crooks are arrested and sent to prison (and Toothpick is soon run over and killed by a train), but Sly disappears and winds up in Ancient Egypt, while Penelope escapes from prison]].
* BladeLock: [[spoiler:Sly and Le Paradox do this in the final boss fight.]]
* BlockPuzzle: A pretty simple one is one of the obstacles Sly overcomes when breaking Tennessee out of prison.
* BossOnlyLevel: The final mission of Chapter 4 consists of only a three-stage boss battle against [[spoiler:Penelope]]. Justified, as it's a RoaringRampageOfRevenge against her for [[spoiler:selling them all out to Le Paradox, breaking Bentley's heart, and plotting to murder Sly and Murray [[{{Yandere}} out of jealousy]]]].
* BookEnds: The game’s first and last missions are both set in Paris.
* BreakingTheFourthWall: El Jefe does the shush gesture at the screen just before he jumps Rioichi.
* TheCameo: [[Franchise/RatchetAndClank Clank]] appears as [[http://slycooper.wikia.com/wiki/Medieval_Metal_Man one of the treasures]] found in the game, and [[VideoGame/JakAndDaxter Daxter]] [[http://slycooper.wikia.com/wiki/Lutrela_Nivadensis also appears.]]
* CallBack: In Bentley's fight against [[spoiler:Penelope]], he will sometimes taunt, "That mech design is so 2005!", which is the year of release of ''Sly 3''.
* ChekhovMIA: [[spoiler:Penelope vanished at the start of the game. She returns in the fourth episode as the Black Knight.]]
* ClothesMakeTheSuperman: Sly obtains various "disguises" that grant him unique abilities.
** The Samurai armor lets him deflect fireballs back at whatever shot at him and gives him an immunity to fire.
** The Jailbird outfit gives him a ball and chain that can be used to smash through objects as well as used to walk through laser fields.
** The Sabretooth skin lets him pounce on specific targets.
** The Archer outfit allows him to use the baskets of arrows to shoot arrows, obviously. Some arrows have ropes attached to them, which can be shot to targets in order to walk across them.
** The [[DepartmentOfRedundancyDepartment Thief]] outfit lets him slow down time as well as give him a massive scimitar for destroying obstacles.
* ConquerorFromTheFuture: The villains have no trouble setting up in their respective eras.
* ContinuityNod:
** When wearing the samurai armor to sneak past one of the guards in Japan, Sly refers to himself as "Major Muggshot", a reference to one of the villains from the first (and later third) game.
** In rescuing one of the Forty Thieves from Ms. Decibel's hypnosis, Bentley mentions that he once saw a device just like it [[VideoGame/Sly2BandOfThieves in Prague]] once. Upon rescuing another, Bentley then outright mentions how Murray was briefly made BrainwashedAndCrazy by The Contessa's PsychicPowers.
* ContrivedCoincidence:
** Murray's necklace ''just happens'' to date back to the [[spoiler:Ice Age, specifically in a region that one of Sly's ancestors occupied, and which has been taken over by one of the bad guy's henchmen.]]
** Likewise, [[spoiler:The Grizz's crown (which looks like a dead ringer for [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St_Edward%27s_Crown St. Edward's Crown]]) dates back to Medieval England in the year 1301, which is where another one of Sly's ancestors can be found.]]
** And of course [[spoiler:a gold coin Carmelita just happened to have picked up as evidence back in the museum dates back to Arabia, where Sly's Ancestor Salim needs help.]]
** Lampshaded by Sly, repeatedly commenting on their remarkable luck.
* DemotedToExtra: Dimitri, who goes from playable character to informant for the gang as they time travel. Which is strange seeing that he has his old voice actor in the credits.
* DenserAndWackier: While the franchise always had goofy moments, this game heavily ramps up the zaniness that occurs with it's scenarios, ranging from Murray seducing a room filled with guards by disguising himself as a geisha, Sly stealing a shipment of a corrupt sherrif's lolipops in order to get himself thrown in prison, and an elephant gaining hyponotic powers due to a trumpet getting stuck in her nose.
* DerailingLoveInterests:
** [[spoiler:Penelope undergoes a SuddenSequelHeelSyndrome, likely to give Bentley some form of personal conflict and justify how the BigBad got access to his time machine project.]]
** Strangely, [[spoiler:both Sly and Carmelita suffer from this. Both of them were happily living as an OfficialCouple, but then Sly returns to the thief life for rather arbitrary reasons and does not appear to treat Carmelita's own feelings about his betrayal seriously. Meanwhile, Carmelita is made way bitchier and can come off as unreasonable in certain scenes. Generally, both characters handle the whole thing as if they were immature teenagers instead of serious adults, seemingly just to add some unnecessary drama to the plot, although they do seem to reconcile by the end.]]
* DevelopersForesight: One upgrade you can buy for Sly is the Flash Bomb, which is a Smoke Bomb but with more smoke. However, you can't really tell it causes a flash... until the final level, which has a dark room. Although there's literally no reason to throw a Flash Bomb in this room, if you do so, the entire screen turns white as a result.
* DidntWeUseThisJokeAlready:
** If Sly's terrible Italian accent in the last game wasn't enough, the gag ends up getting repeated in Chapter 4 during the "Juggling Act" mission, with a very subtle response from Bentley:
--->'''Sly:''' How does this sound for a stage name? [[JustAStupidAccent "The Amazing Cooperoni!"]] Eh? Eh? Right? It's good.
--->'''Bentley:''' It sounds like bad Italian takeout.
** And it's used ''again'' when Sly had to impersonate a delivery boy for Miss Decibel and Le Paradox... in ''ancient Arabia''. [[LampshadeHanging Le Paradox understandably asks the "delivery boy" if there's something wrong with his voice.]]
* DisneyVillainDeath: [[spoiler:Subverted with Le Paradox, thus making him the first FinalBoss in the Sly series to not die.]]
* DistractedByTheSexy: A mission in Chapter 1 has Murray [[DisguisedInDrag disguising himself as "Madame Geisha"]] and [[AttractiveBentGender managing to distract some guards]]. A much later mission in Chapter 5 sees Carmelita Fox performing a belly dance (with great reluctance) to distract some guards while the rest of the team unlocks a gate.
* DistressedDude:
** Toothpick locks up Sly, Bentley and Murray at one point in the game, requiring Tennessee Kid Cooper and Carmelita to rescue them.
** All the Cooper Ancestors [[spoiler:except for Salim]] are captured at the beginning of each episode. Sir Galleth deserves this the most, since [[spoiler:he gets captured by the Moat Monster and has to be saved by Carmelita, much to his humiliation]].
* DwindlingParty: In the final mission, Bentley and Murray recruit the ancestors to help them get their canes back, and to rescue Sly and Carmelita. After each ancestor's segment, they end up returning back to their respective eras.
* EasterEgg:
** [[spoiler:Clockwerk can be seen in various areas in ''every'' episode]] as shown [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U_Z6vzxelZ8 here.]] Also related to this is the "Dragon Claw" item which has a short message scratched into the bottom of it: [[spoiler:"Clockwerk was here."]]
** Sanzaru's monkey head logo design can be seen as a decorative emblem for attentive players to spot, including a streetlight in Paris, Toothpick's belt buckle, and Sly's backpack.
* EvenMooksHaveLovedOnes: PlayedForLaughs in "Of Mice and Mechs". There's a mission where you have to spy on enemy Mooks for information, and said goons constantly talk about their married lives, taking their children to the park, and even ask for advice on how to meet women. What makes it funny is said mooks are ''[[MechaMooks clattering wolf robots]]''.
* FaceHeelTurn: Turns out the Black Knight is [[spoiler:Penelope, who believes Sly is wasting Bentley's potential]].
* {{Fanservice}}: Carmelita with the belly dancing, plus certain camera angles.
* FatFlex: One of Murray's [[IdleAnimation idle animations]] has him flex to a fitter body shape...before his stomach plops out, causing his belt to fall off and pulling it back up in embarrassment.
* {{Foreshadowing}}:
** The tutorial mission has a few good ones. Villains encountered later in the game are chatting with the museum owner in Sly's infiltration and the big blueprint for [[spoiler:Le Paradox's time blimp]] seen much later in the game appears just before Bentley's hacking tutorial.
** One of the treasures you can find in Episode 3 is [[spoiler:a pair of ice skates labeled as Grizz's Skates]]. Guess what happens in his boss fight...
** There are several hints to the true identity of the Black Knight in the Episode "Of Mice and Mechs":
*** The title of the episode itself is a subtle hint of what is to come: [[spoiler:Penelope, a mouse, created the machines and turned against the Cooper Gang.]]
*** The Black Knight's armor has what looks like an icon of a mouse on it. [[spoiler:As in, Penelope Mouse, for the icon is a silhouette of Penelope herself.]]
*** When Bentley researches information on the Black Knight, he finds no information. In the same Episode beforehand, Penelope is brought up again as Bentley wonders where she is once again. [[spoiler:Penelope herself is in the medieval era, disguising herself as the Black Knight.]]
*** This isn't the first time that [[spoiler:Penelope went under an alias with the word "Black" in the title. The last time was in the third Sly game under the alias "The Black Baron".]] As a CallBack, it's mentioned on occasion during loading screens.
*** The text color of the Black Knight is purple, [[spoiler:the same color of Penelope.]]
*** It's foreshadowed as far back as the intro cutscene: [[spoiler:A blueprint of the Black Knight can be seen on a wall in Penelope's room after she disappears when Bentley searches for her.]]
* FriendOrIdolDecision: Bentley is truly torn between sitting out the fight with the Black Knight [[spoiler:aka Penelope]], and assisting Sly and his gang in the Knight's defeat. In the end, Bentley shows up just in the nick of time, and remarks he realized that his family is more important to him than his personal problems, and they could have been hurt by his inaction.
* FriendVersusLover: [[spoiler:The second half of the fourth chapter becomes this, with Bentley having to choose between his TrueCompanions Sly and Murray, or his evil girlfriend Penelope. He chooses Sly and Murray, and burns bridges with Penelope for her {{greed}} and [[UngratefulBitch lack of gratitude towards them]].]]
* GameplayAndStorySegregation: On a number of occasions, the van's time machine breaks or certain characters run off on their own as part of the story. The "Time Travel" to other periods and "Replay Jobs" menu in the hideout is completely unaffected and said characters are available in other locations to replay jobs or just futz around with.
* GasMaskMooks: [[spoiler:Le Paradox]]'s rat guards.
* GetBackHereBoss: El Jefe. Sly even lampshaded this.
* GuestStarPartyMember: While Sly, Bentley, Murray [[spoiler:and [[EnemyMine Carmelita]], [[SixthRanger eventually]]]] can be selected in each era, each of Sly's ancestors can only be played in the era they're specifically from, for obvious reasons.
* HailfirePeaks: Gungathal Valley and Clan of the Cave Raccoon.
* HeroicBSOD: Bentley falls into this [[spoiler:upon realizing that the reason Penelope had vanished in the beginning was because she IS the Black Knight in the Middle Ages episode and had sold out the Cooper Gang to Le Paradox. Needless to say, he took it really hard, tucking inside his shell]], but eventually uses his [[spoiler:newfound hatred of Penelope to get over his heartbreak and save his best friends from her]].
* HistoryRepeats: A member of the Cooper Gang [[spoiler:who's a technological genius deciding to go rogue because of growing resentment towards their leader? Yep, it looks like Sly now has his own Dr. M]].
* HoistByHisOwnPetard: [[spoiler:Le Paradox's father planned to steal something and frame Sly's father for it. Only to get there ''after Sly's dad had already stolen it'', getting caught by the police and having it pinned on him instead of the other way around.]]
* HypocriticalHumor: Near the end with [[spoiler:Tennessee Kid of all people commenting on how [[YeOldeButcheredeEnglishe Sir Galleth]] has a strange way of speaking while using one of his [[UsefulNotes/AmericanAccents "southern"]] expressions.]]
* AnIcePerson: In his boss battle, The Grizz has the ability to send out ice waves that freeze Murray.
* IdiotBall: Sly leaves a calling card after stealing the artifact in the tutorial. Even if Carmelita hadn't walked in, that would have ruined his relationship with her by blowing his amnesia cover.
* IndyPloy: In Chapter 4, the mission briefing is pretty short [[spoiler:since Bentley is inactive]] and nobody has really come up with a plan other than "storm the castle and [[spoiler:''kill'' Penelope]]". The team decides that they'll have to make up the plan as they go along.
* {{Infodump}}: The optional opening cutscene has Sly summarize the ending to ''Sly 3'', followed by going into his relationship and history with Carmelita, then giving us a description on Bentley and what he's been up to since the end of the third game, then doing the same for Murray, before finally going into describing the reason behind the heist that makes up the prologue. All of this takes [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nhDHtr6oRKw about five minutes]].
* InterfaceSpoiler: Every character, as you know, has a color associated with them. The Black Knight's color is [[spoiler:pink, which was ''Penelope's'' color in ''Sly 3''.]]
* IronicHell: El Jefe is a heavy smoker of Cuban cigars. Once he's arrested, he does time rolling Cuban cigars and is not allowed to smoke them.
%%* {{Irony}}: See HoistByHisOwnPetard above.
* ItsPersonal: [[spoiler:Once Sly learns the truth about Penelope, he has sworn that he will kill her for her actions against his ancestors, breaking Bentley's heart, and being an UngratefulBitch]].
* IUhYouToo: Towards the end of the game:
-->'''Carmelita:''' Sly... I...\\
'''Sly:''' I know. Me too.
* {{Jerkass}}: Le Paradox. He doesn't treat his men well such as not paying The Grizz, likely planning to get rid of [[spoiler:Penelope]], [[spoiler:not letting Ms. Decibel on the ship near the end of the game]], and furthermore just being a snobbish jerk to Sly Cooper's friends and ancestors by ruining time and trying to kill them.
* KickTheDog: [[spoiler:Penelope finishes her {{Yandere}} gloating by stating that Bentley is "cute when he's being dumb". He takes ''great'' offense to it]].
* LatexPerfection: This is how Dimitri disguised himself as Sly in the trailer.
* LoadsAndLoadsOfLoading: While the first three games have very short loading times, Thieves in Time can occasionally get painfully slow while loading. The game has a LoadingScreen that tracks your progression and gives some hints or lore, but it gets boring quick.
* MatrixRainingCode: Numbers rain down in the little loading screens that appear before and after Bentley's hacking minigames.
* MeaningfulName:
** The last/main name of the BigBad Le '''Paradox''', guess what he's trying to do. If you guessed: [[spoiler:"Change history so that '''he''' is royalty" and the Coopers never existed]], you are correct.
** Despite Sly's joking about El Jefe meaning "Big Baby", it actually means "The Boss". In a story sense, he's '''the boss''' of his men, while in a meta sense, he's '''[[BossBattle the boss]]''' of the chapter.
** The '''Black''' Knight, who is the false identity of [[spoiler:Penelope, who also was the '''Black''' Baron]].
** Ms. Decibel is a [[MusicalAssassin sound-based]] villain.
* MedievalEuropeanFantasy: "Of Mice and Mechs", set in Medieval England.
* MisplacedWildlife: "40 Thieves", set in Ancient Arabia, features [[SinisterScimitar Siamese]] [[BedlahBabe Cats]], a native breed of Thailand, as Guards. This can be explained away, as "the Orient," while commonly referring to Asia, can include UsefulNotes/TheMiddleEast. The [[ThrowDownTheBomblet Grenade]] Baboons are less dubious, for baboons can be found in both Africa and the Arabian Peninsula.
* MonstrousScenery: Throughout each level, Clockwerk, the villain of the first game, can be seen in the background of the scenery, watching you.
* MusicalNod: The music during the side-scrolling version of Bentley's hacking sequences uses the same music as his one hacking game in the first game.
* NeverFoundTheBody: [[spoiler:Sly's friends refuse to believe he is dead when he disappears at the end of the game. Of course, this is an example where the character is ultimately revealed to be alive in the same game.]]
* NiceJobBreakingItHero: Sir Galleth unplugs a huge plug thinking it would "slay" the 3-headed robot dragon. It doesn't, it ''ACTIVATES'' it.
* NoodleIncident: Sly mentions the time Murray won a burrito eating contest. The only thing commented on it was that it was a bad memory and that Bentley couldn't enter the van for a month.
* NotSoDifferentRemark: After years of [[BlackAndWhiteMorality thinking all criminals are the same]], Carmelita acknowledges in the cutscene "You Choppy" that after fighting alongside Sly and his friends, she's realized they have a strong sense of morality just as she does.
-->'''Carmelita:''' We aren't really so different. We both fight for justice: we just do it from opposite sides of the law.
* OOCIsSeriousBusiness:
** Multiple times throughout the game, [[BigEater Murray]] turns down food. At first, he does it in Chapter 3 after Bentley sends in Bob to climb an ice wall despite Murray's insistence that he can do it himself, and he later does so in the cutscene after Chapter 5. In the final cutscene of the game, Murray turns down an ice cream, pie, and cake [[spoiler:after Sly's disappearance]].
** During the final cutscene, after Dimitri finds out that [[spoiler:Sly is gone]], he turns off his music and sulks in his room.
* PainfulAdhesiveRemoval: In the animated companion short "Sly Cooper: Timing is Everything", Carmelita Fox is captured and restrained in a supply closet by Mugshot and his men. Sly Cooper finds her and pulls of piece of tape on her mouth. Cue in her loud scream followed by her growling at Cooper for being well Cooper.
* PassThePopcorn: In the opening cutscene, while Bentley describes the words of the Thievius Raccoonus disappearing off of the pages and his plan to investigate the cause, Murray is eating from a bag of popcorn.
* PressXToNotDie: [[spoiler:The Le Paradox boss fight relies on quick time commands during the [[SwordFight sword/cane fight]] portions.]]
* PublicDomainSoundtrack: The piano piece Ms. Decibel plays during "Heavy Metal Meltdown" contains snippets of "Rule, Britannia."
* RapidFireNo: The Grizz to Murray just prior to his boss fight.
-->'''The Grizz:''' I'm tired of you Cooper chumps, Le Paradox, everybody! All I ever really wanted to do... is skate - that's right.\\
'''Murray:''' ''[confused]'' Uh okay...\\
'''The Grizz:''' No, no, no, no, no, it ''ain't'' okay!
* TheReasonYouSuckSpeech: [[spoiler:Towards the end, Sly tells Le Paradox that he's a complete idiot for messing with his ancestors in the first place, and that he could've avoided ''everything'' bad that happened to him in the game and lived his life in peace in the present as a billionaire thief.]]
-->'''Sly:''' [[spoiler:You had it made. You could have been the biggest thief of all time, but you had to target my ancestors and blow your own cover. You exposed your operation because of your ego! No Cooper would have done that. And for the record, can you really say you stole the canes? Seems like your "friends" did all the real work.]]
* RedHerring: [[spoiler:You can see Clockwerk in various points of each in the hub worlds; he has absolutely nothing to do with the plot, and is basically an EasterEgg.]]
* RedemptionRejection: [[spoiler:Bentley points out to Penelope that Le Paradox is just using her, and would cut her strings when finished, clearly trying to convince her to rejoin the people who care about her. She refuses spitefully and attacks him in her VillainousBreakdown, leading to the Cooper Gang kicking her out in retaliation]].
* ReplayMode: The Cooper Gang's van allows you to play older missions again through the "Replay Jobs" option. Meanwhile, cutscenes and Chalk Talks (the presentations Bentley does in each chapter) are available for your viewing pleasure in the Extras menu. Naturally, your selections in these menus are increased as you encounter them in the story proper.
* RippleEffectIndicator: The plot is kicked off by Bentley seeing the words written in the ''Thievius Raccoonus'' literally vanishing off their pages.
* RippleEffectProofMemory: The ''Thievius Raccoonus'' is being erased because the Cooper ancestors who wrote them are being interfered with. This has no effect on any of the skills Sly learned from the book.
* SaveTheVillain: [[spoiler:At the climax, when the blimp is beginning to crash, Sly chooses to save Le Paradox instead of letting him fall to his death. [[UngratefulBastard Le Paradox repays Sly by stealing his paraglider and leaving him to die.]]]]
* SceneryPorn: Dear lord, Sanzaru Games really worked hard on the backgrounds.
* SequelHook: The ending has [[spoiler:Sly missing, and everybody in the gang trying to find him. The secret ending reveals that Sly is still alive, but because of the rift in time that Le Paradox created, he's trapped in Ancient Egypt]], not to mention [[spoiler:Penelope escaping prison in the end credits and sending postcards to Bentley]].
* ShipSinking: [[spoiler:Penelope JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope leads to her and Bentley breaking up for good.]] Darkly lampshaded when, before the [[spoiler:Rock 'Em Sock 'Em Robots portion of her boss fight, Penelope tells Bentley it's time to make their breakup official]].
* ShoutOut: To [[Film/BackToTheFuture1 Back to the Future]], as it involves time travel and a time traveling vehicle. When the Cooper Gang makes their first time jump, Murray speeds the van up and vanishes, leaving behind flaming tire trails just like the time Delorean. It even leaves behind a spinning license plate.
* ShowSomeLeg: Carmelita takes one for the team by doing a belly dance to distract some guards in Arabia. She's not happy about it either. Seeing how the rest of the guys [[EatingTheEyeCandy take a glance to see the show]] they're not as upset as she is.
-->'''Sly:''' Possibly your best plan ever, Bentley.
* SmellySkunk: Le Paradox. A lot of characters have brought up his odor problem. And yet, he uses it to his advantage, providing... ammunition for the gas guns his mooks carry.
* SnapBack: If you choose to go back to a previous time period, the respective Cooper from said time period is not only still playable, [[spoiler:but still HAS his cane despite it being stolen in an earlier cutscene.]]
* SnarkToSnarkCombat: At least half the dialogue between Bentley and Sly.
* SoftWater: [[spoiler:The only reason why Le Paradox didn't die after losing his stolen parachute was because he conveniently fell into a river.]]
* StealthPun:
** [[spoiler:After Penelope's betrayal is revealed]], Bentley falls into a HeroicBSOD, hides in his shell, and won't come out. In other words, Bentley "won't come out of his shell."
** Rioichi's Sushi Restaurant has doors with '''locks''' that are only opened by having a specific Sushi '''knife'''. In other words, these doors are operated on a [[BladeLock Blade]] [[VisualPun Lock]].
* StoppedNumberingSequels: Notice the lack of a 4 in the title.
* StormingTheCastle: "Of Mice and Mechs" ends with the Cooper Gang storming a castle occupied by the Black Knight in a RoaringRampageOfRevenge. This is because the Black Knight is [[spoiler:Penelope, now a homicidal GoldDigger and {{yandere}} who wants Sly and Murray (and probably anyone else close to Bentley) dead]]. Sly has already made it clear to Sir Galleth after TheReveal that [[spoiler:he intends to kill her, while Galleth points out that Penelope's crimes would warrant execution in the 14th century for treason, and they should be the ones to do it]].
%%* SuddenDownerEnding
* SymbolSwearing: This is how the steer react during the sarsaparilla serving portion of the "Saloon Bug" job if they're close to losing their patience at the counter.
* {{Technobabble}}: Bentley as usual is the source of this, though he gets bonus points for mentioning a "Gravity Encabulator" as one of the components of the time machine, a reference to the "turboencabulator" InJoke among real life electrical engineers.
* ThisIsUnforgivable: [[spoiler:Penelope betraying her former allies, and breaking Bentley's heart]] was enough for Sly to [[ItsPersonal declare war]] on them.
* TimeAndRelativeDimensionsInSpace: ''Thieves in Time'' takes the destination programming route, programming being done via analyzing an object from the specified time period. They were [[ContrivedCoincidence quite lucky]] to be able to find objects that were not only from the correct era, but even right down to the exact year, month, and ''day'' needed.
* TimeTravelForFunAndProfit: Plan of all of the villains.
* TragicKeepsake: [[spoiler:In the final cutscene, Carmelita, while continuing the hunt for Sly, finds the photo he always kept around of himself kissing her, charred but intact.]]
* TrailersAlwaysSpoil: [[spoiler:The montage at the end of [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8Ww1T-qaQM Bentley's promotional animated short]] showed the picture of Penelope he keeps in his binocucom defaced, spoiling her FaceHeelTurn as well as the outcome of it.]]
* TrapIsTheOnlyOption: Sly and Bentley recognize that [[spoiler:Carmelita sitting right in the middle of an empty room]] is an obvious set up, but Sly can't [[spoiler:[[AlwaysSavetheGirl just leave Carmelita]]]], and springing the trap does distract Le Paradox long enough for [[spoiler:the Cooper Ancestors to take back their canes.]]
* TreacheryIsASpecialKindOfEvil: [[spoiler:After Penelope is busted as the BlackKnight]], Sir Galleth tells Sly that the main way to deal with traitors like this one is to storm their stronghold (a castle in this case) and kill the traitor. [[spoiler:Sly reluctantly agrees, admitting Penelope deserves to be killed for manipulating Bentley]].
* TronLines: A lot of these can be found throughout the game, most noticeably the giant fish ad in "Turning Japanese".
* TrophyRoom: There are trophy rooms in each hideout, consisting of treasures and trophies collected throughout the game. The ones you get from vaults have effects on the gameplay.
* VillainHasAPoint: [[spoiler:Penelope]] is technically right in that Bentley could be using his intelligence to accomplish far greater things than working for a thief, something Bentley even acknowledges. This does not in any way excuse their actions, though.
* TheWebAlwaysExisted: Not only are you able to access [=ThiefNet=] during ages where even ''electricity'' had not yet been discovered, but you are also somehow able to instantaneously teleport your purchases to you, whenever and wherever you may be. Though this might have something to do with the communicator Bentley made.
* WhamEpisode: The mission "Shell Shocked Heart". Bentley is following the Black Knight, only to discover that [[spoiler:it's ''Penelope'', his girlfriend. She's undergone a FaceHeelTurn that makes poor Bentley go into a HeroicBSOD and hide himself under his shell.]]
* TheWildWest: Cotton Mouth Bluff, the setting of "Go West, Young Raccoon."
* {{Wutai}}: "Turning Japanese", which takes place in Feudal Japan.
* YeOldeButcheredeEnglishe: This is how Sir Galleth speaks.
* YouDontLookLikeYou: Many of the characters have undergone some visual tweaks with the change in console generations, but [[spoiler:Clockwerk]] has been radically redesigned from how they looked in ''Thevius Raccoonus'', to the point you might not realize it's them when first spotted. Most notably [[spoiler:he looks much more like an owl this time around. Compare [[https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/sly/images/f/f4/Clockwerk_Surfaces.png/revision/latest?cb=20120105221105 this]] and [[https://vignette.wikia.nocookie.net/sly/images/a/a7/Original.jpeg/revision/latest?cb=20130228220200 this.]]]]
* YouHaveResearchedBreathing: Some of the abilities you can buy are rather... odd. Sly and Murray need to buy the ability to run while charging their attacks, Sly needs to buy the ability to run while on a rope, and Bentley needs to buy the ability to kick his bombs (despite said move only requiring you to do Bentley's regular kick attack while next to a bomb).
* YouMonster: Sir Galleth says a 14th century variant when he charges at [[spoiler:Penelope]] in rage.
-->'''Galleth:''' I'll sally forth and smash that mechanical monstrosity!
* YouNeedABreathMint: Red-Eye, the coyote gunslinger from the "Grand Key Larceny" mission. After telling Carmelita that she has to kiss him if she loses the shooting competition, Carmelita remarks that his breath smells like "fermented gym socks."

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