Sly Cooper

Sly Cooper is the eponymous main protagonist of the Sly Cooper games.

Sly is a male, raccoon thief and is best friends with Bentley and Murray, who are also members of his gang. He has a complicated romantic relationship with Inspector Carmelita Fox, who was his partner when he worked for INTERPOL after faking amnesia. He is currently stuck in ancient Egypt.

Appearance
Being a raccoon, Sly has gray fur with black stripes on his tail and a natural mask, as well as brown eyes. His nose has a blue tinge to it, but it is only seen in artwork and seems to have been dropped from his design in Thieves in Time. His ensemble consists of a black mask, blue elbow-sleeved shirt with a yellow collar, blue boots, blue gloves with yellow cuffs, and a blue cap. Around his waist is a belt with the buckle shaped in the form of the Cooper symbol. He initially wore a red backpack, which contained goods and calling cards, but traded it out for a leg pouch in Sly 2: Band of Thieves. He wore both a leg pouch, for goods, and a brown backpack with the Sanzaru Games logo on it, for paragliders, in Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time.

Personality
Sly is a cunning, devious, quick-witted, charming, suave gentleman thief. He uses his wit, courage, charm and skills to pull off jobs, and often crack jokes and sarcastic comments at the expense of others. Sly is also very cool, collected and manages to keep a rational head in stressful and chaotic situations. Through all of his hardships, he remains loyal and dedicated to any he calls his friend, particularly Bentley and Murray, and Inspector Carmelita Fox, despite her attempts to put him behind bars.

In the beginning of the series, Sly was very cocky and driven by his own personal goals. On occasion, he would scold Bentley for slowing missions. He often disregarded Bentley's advice and warnings, and sometimes spoke rudely of Murray. At the end of the first game, Sly openly admitted that he wouldn't have made it that far without them both, leading to his respectful resolution in the future games.

By Sly 2, Sly developed more of an appreciation for his team. He has great confidence in their skills while retaining his inherently cocky nature. He fully came to appreciate them after being captured by Contessa.

By Sly 3, Sly became an entirely new thief, though with the sarcasm, witty banter, quips and debonair charm still intact. He can't imagine his life without his team. He now takes the feelings of Bentley and Murray seriously, always on the lookout for when they were bothered or sad.

Abilities
Sly's primary weapon in the series is his family's cane, which is a brown staff ending in a golden hook. Many of his ancestors also had weapons incorporating the trademark hook, and the cane has become an infamous symbol of the Cooper Gang. Sly is also very capable with his cane and is a powerful opponent in a fight, repeatedly being shown beating opponents much larger and better equipped than himself.

Years of training and natural ability passed down through the Cooper bloodline have given Sly vast agility, balance, and reflexes, allowing him to perform feats that few can equal. In addition, he has learned every ability detailed in the Thievius Raccoonus, including balancing on the tops of sharp points, rope and pole climbing, invisibility, swinging on hooks, and running on wires. His skills include parkour, gymnastics, pickpocketing, safecracking, mastery of disguise, time manipulation and others.

Trivia

 * Sly Cooper bears a striking resemblance to Jojo the Raccoon from Sucker Punch's first title Rocket: Robot on Wheels.
 * Sly's signature color is blue. Unlike Bentley and Murray (and most characters), his is not based off his skin or fur, but off of his attire.
 * Sly wears an actual mask over the mask-like fur around his eyes.
 * Sly is often shown smoking in concept art.
 * Concepts shown in a "making of" movie in Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus show that Sly's early designs ranged from him wearing nothing more than his hat and shoes to even being chubby.
 * Sly Cooper won "Best New Character" at the Game Developer's Conference in 2002, and the Best Stealth Character by DragonAx in 2011.
 * Sly is of multi-racial descent (English, Scottish, Middle Eastern, Egyptian and Japanese in particular) based on his ancestry.
 * Sucker Punch originally planned Sly's name to be JT, not Sly, accompanied with a different voice actor. This can be found in in the "The Evolution of Sly" bonus video in Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves.
 * Sly, Bentley and Murray, in contrast to their real life species, can't swim because they never learned how to when they were in the orphanage. In Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus, you can get a page from the Thievius Raccoonus that lets you recover from falling into water. This does not carry over to the second and third games, but collecting Sir Raleigh's Frog Hat from the safe in Of Mice and Mechs of Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time gives the ability to every playable character.
 * Sly uses two signatures throughout the series; in Sly 2: Band of Thieves, when he sends Carmelita some postcards, he uses a capital "S" as his signature, but other times he uses his whole first name.
 * Sly's last name "Cooper" can mean "barrel-maker" in the English language. This is possibly a reference to how, in the first two games, Sly is able to hide in barrels to avoid being seen by his enemies.
 * During cutscenes in Sly Cooper and the Thievius Raccoonus, Sly appears to have entirely yellow gloves and black shoes. During gameplay, he has blue gloves and shoes.
 * In Thieves in Time, there is a Sanzaru logo on Sly's backpack.
 * Sly is three years younger than Carmelita.
 * In the Thieves in Time episode Turning Japanese, Sly passes himself off as "Major Muggshot," as a reference to the member of the Fiendish Five.
 * As the Sly Cooper series has released all over the world, there are many voice actors for Sly Cooper in different languages.
 * In Japanese, Sly was voiced by Tomokazu Seki in the first two games. Takeshi Kusao eventually took over as of the 3rd game and in his appearance in the Japanese dub of Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale, as well as re-recording Sly's dialogue in the Japanese version of the Sly Cooper Collection.
 * Sly was voiced by Rais David Báscones in Spanish, later replaced by Cholo Moratalla in PlayStation Move Heroes. Sly was voiced by Javier Naldjían in the Latin American dubs of Thieves in Time and Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale.
 * In Sly 2, Sly is the only member of the gang who doesn't serve as the starting character for the heist of an episode. However, in Sly 3, he is the starting character for every heist.