What's the slimmest looking halfcab? They look good in photos but kinda potatoey and stupid on my feet. I skated them a lot mid to late 2000's and I swear they were somewhat slimmer. I know there's a lot of different versions, just can't find what I'm looking for.
The funny thing with Half Cabs, almost any of them really, are that they work best with bigger pants, or at least they always seem to me to look better with thicker jeans or work pants, compared to some other shoes / pants combos. Decent pants and Half Cabs look normal to me, but thinner lower leg, shorter leg or shorts, they just look silly when I look at them.
I used to wear / squeeze into size 11s for a long time, but have resigned myself to go up to size 12 in more recent years so I definitely want pants to nicely cover them, so they don't look too big.
When I skate in them I do them up pretty tight. As chillers, I just have the laces loose so they are pretty much big slip ons, so they always look bigger then too.
Just down to how you like to wear them, but I think doing up laces and finding the right outfits can make any Half Cabs work better and not have them look too big.
* Re read your post and I have some early Half Cabs that were on par with the current ones, although at some point they did change to be way thinner overall, but are now a bit more normal again, both the Classic and the Skate versions. The special 92 versions might be a bit bigger / thicker though, from a few pairs I tried on.
The plain black / white Skate versions I tried on seemed a bit lower, maybe a touch less bulky looking, but not so much thinner.