Mastering Knack’s Unlockable Gadgets

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Mastering Knack’s Unlockable Gadgets

PS4 released in North America on November 15th, and it was wonderful to see the response! We sold over a million units in the first day, which set a record for any console in the PlayStation family.

Knack: Sunstone Battery

Knack released alongside PS4, which was also very nice and a culmination of a lot of hard work! We’re excited to have the game out in the wild, so to speak. Now that it’s out there, we wanted to take a little time to explain how having friends on PlayStation Network can enhance the game by boosting the number of gadgets you can collect.

There are over sixty secret rooms in Knack, and contained within these rooms are treasure chests – when Knack opens a chest, a random item pops out. Most of these items are parts of gadgets that will help Knack in his quest. There are eight gadgets in all, and they vary greatly in their difficulty to construct. Simpler gadgets are made of three parts, and the tougher gadgets are made of up to seven parts.

Knack: Double BatteryKnack: Secret Room Box

However, you have help! If any of your friends have found this same secret room, you can see the item that they found there. If you’d prefer the item that a friend found – perhaps it’s the final part of a gadget you’re trying to complete – you can choose that instead. So if you have a friend or two playing Knack, it becomes much easier to construct and use these gadgets. It’s a huge boost when you’re looking for the final part to complete a set. Simply put, if you’re playing by yourself, you’ll probably only pick up one or two gadgets on your first playthrough – but with friends, you will be able to build and use almost all of them!

You can also collect these parts while you’re on the go. Knack’s Quest is a free downloadable game for iOS devices (Android version coming soon), where you can also unlock gadget parts and rare Relics for use in the full Knack game on PS4. Knack’s Quest is a standalone three-in-a-row jewel game featuring Knack himself. Gather parts to help Knack grow before the time runs out to clear the level. Unlock endless mode by beating all levels, and post your scores in global and friend rankings.

Knack: Combo Meter

Knack: Combo Meter

One of the most useful gadgets is the Combo Meter, which is made out of seven parts. That’s quite a few, but if you’re playing with friends, it’s not too hard to collect all of them. Once you’ve built it and equipped it, Knack will have a new ability – the more times he damages an enemy, the stronger his attacks get. In the screenshot above, he’s managed to hit his enemies 24 times!

Another extremely useful gadget is the Secret Detector. You need to collect sets of parts in order to build the gadgets, and the parts are all in treasure chests in hidden rooms, right? If you have the Secret Detector, you are alerted whenever you are near one of these rooms – so you’ll be picking up collectibles much faster.

You can also build a Relic Detector. Whenever you are near relics, it flashes. This means that you’ll never walk by a source of relics again without knowing it. Here you can see Knack in Viktor’s palace… did you know that there are relics in the floor waxers?

Knack: Transmuter

The Time Dilator takes a bit of effort to master, but it can also be very useful. When it is equipped, time slows down if Knack damages a number of enemies in succession within a short time period. The more enemies Knack hits, the slower time gets – so you’ll have more time to strategize about which enemy to attack (and how to attack it) in order to keep the chain going. Getting hit will end the chain, though, so be careful to dodge enemy counter-attacks!

There are two gadgets that boost Knack’s special moves. The Sunstone Battery is pretty simple – it allows Knack to store an additional super move’s worth of energy. The Double Battery is much tougher to construct (some of the parts are very rare), but it allows Knack to accumulate twice as much sunstone energy and then release it with much stronger super moves. There are very, very few enemies in the game that can survive the Shockwave super move if Knack has equipped the Double Battery and then filled up the sunstone gauge.

Knack: Harvester

The final two gadgets are the Transmuter and the Harvester. The Transmuter really comes in handy in a pinch – when Knack is low on health and breaks sunstones, the Transmuter uses the sunstone energy to heal Knack.

The Harvester is quite different – when Knack defeats enemies, they release sunstones. It may not seem as if Knack is picking up much energy from the defeated enemies, but over the course of a level it adds up! Knack can do quite a few more super moves with the Harvester equipped.

So those are the eight gadgets in the game! If you have friends playing Knack, you can really take advantage of that when building the gadgets — it’s almost like trading with them. If you don’t have any friends and you’d like to see all of the gadgets, what you need to do is load an already completed game and then select “continue.” You’ll start the game at the beginning, but you’ll keep all of the items you already picked up. You should be able to have all gadgets collected by the middle of your second playthrough – and you’ll have likely unlocked Vampire Knack as well. But that’s a subject for another post!

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93 Comments

  • Hey Mark. First of all, CONGRATS on both the PS4 design, and Knack! Secondly, I’m so sorry that people gave Knack a bad rap. The game may have a few soar spots, but overall the game is fantastic. It has classic platforming at heart, the secret rooms and collectibles lend a CONSTANT need to “keep playing” that works, the environment design is one of the best I’ve seen in years! Every new section I made it too, drew me in and made me want to explore. The game is simply classic, addicting fun! Thanks for making a game that true gaming fans can be appreciative of. I for one, was glad to have something other than a shooter to play at the launch of my PS4.

  • For those multi system users.

    The Xbox 360 black Friday sales have been live for a while. Just spent 20$ there on three games that don’t exist on the PSN, even if it was updated.

    Why is M$ always so much faster?

  • well the Blog’s updated too see what ? Retail Prices of games i can get in my local store. this is sad. it’s a very small list as well. nothing new nothing changed this isn’t big . you may as well just say ” PSN BF Same as your Retailers Prices.. But Digital ! what a waist of time -_-

  • wow just saw the very small list of psn black Friday deals.

    WHY WHY WHY did they make us wait and give us no information, only to have such a tiny sale?

    At least they’ve matched retailer prices in some cases for people who prefer digital.

    But now I wish I had gone to Futureshop or Gamestop today instead of waiting for this sale (I prefer digital)

  • Sorry to double post.

    Just thought I should mention something positive.

    Bioshock Infinite is currently 13.99. As far as I know that beats retailers.

    Not to mention ( at least for me ) it’s an amazing game.

    So if you don’t have it…. think about it :)

  • the deals are live, bioshock infinite and rayman legends vita :( thats it lol others too much $$$$$

  • I was hoping to play the Knack’s Quest a bit during commute before playing knack (as I have a stack of other games to play) but its been two weeks and no android version. Oh well back to AC4, KZ, Ys, Rayman, ….omg

  • When will the PSN and PS STORE be working again SONY??!

    VERY FRUSTRATING!

  • From now on, release the Android version FIRST or simultaneously! More people have Android now!

  • Any more of an update than “soon” for the app? Not everyone is an Apple slave ya know. :)

  • If you guys had read the PlayStation Podcast, you’d have already known about:

    http://us.playstation.com/black-friday-2013/

  • Mark! Get the whip crackin on the Knack’s Quest team for Android. It should have been out two weeks ago!.

  • First off I’d like to say that I really love Knack; it’s the old school platformer I’ve been looking for for a while now. However, like many other players, I have a huge problem with “Diamond Knack”. The diamond pieces are simply too rare. I’m on my 5th playthrough, and yet I’ve still only obtained 3 out of the 10 diamond pieces to unlock Diamond Knack!

    Normally this wouldn’t bother me; I love challenging trophies, but this isn’t about challenge at all. Rather, it’s based purely on luck, and I don’t think it’s fair to have trophies depend solely on luck. In my opinion, Knack should be patched to make the diamonds more forgiving to obtain. It’s extremely frustrating to continue to obtain crystal pieces for items/forms I’ve already fully unlocked, when all I need is diamonds. I’ve read many other gamers having the same issue, and it’s really a shame; people are feeling bitter about the game after initially loving it, all because of the diamonds being far too rare. I truly hope that you will consider making diamonds less grueling to obtain.

    Thank you

  • What a joke, still no App for Android.

  • tiny stop being inaporpte mod can you remove his coment

  • Love this game, but SUPER disappointed that you can’t change difficulty on your second play through. Played through on easy, but wanted to play again because I still have a ton to collect. But I have to play on easy again! If I want normal or hard, I have to start over from scratch, and lose everything I collected. So dumb.

  • @ tiny_tim31

    That’s gross.

  • I really enjoy Knack and appreciate its platform design. I was surprised by the difficulty initially, but after readjusting my play style I’m now progressing through the game at a steady pace.

    Is it true your game+ option is restricted to the difficulty in which you started on? What was the reasoning behind this?

    For those looking for rare artifacts, I’ve found spending some time on the Live panel to be of great benefit. Look for those who are streaming their gameplay and send them a friend invite! It’s made my Knack play through far more enjoyable.

    On a side note, it would be great if I could shoot a friend request from the Streaming screen itself, instead of memorizing the gamer tag.

  • Android coming soon?! good one. too little & too late.

  • I agree with Ecks on all his points. I’m trying to go for the platinum and I like a challenge, but the stupid diamond grind is the most uninspired slap in the face to a player I’ve ever seen. Currently playing it for the 5th time and need 2 more diamonds. I only used that “trick” Ecks mentioned to get one diamond but even that took me about an hour to do. After that I still have to play on Hard and Very Hard with a clean slate. I could probably beat the game with my eyes closed at this point but it certainly is no longer fun to play.

    I’m sure someone on the design team thought this was a rediculous requirement on the player. You should have listened to that person when they brought it up.

  • i was really loving and enjoying Knack, unfortunataly this stupid grind to get all diamonds, crystal etc, is ridiculous and it actually ruined the game, and i have stopped playing it, till the developers fix this with an update, i have addes people who have knack aswell, and the tip mark give us it doesnt work as all my friends have gotten the same crystal or relics than me, nor diamonds etc… if i’d known knack would have this silly grind to get a trophy, i had pass this game,

    anyway if someone wanna add me to share those stupid crystal or relics, add me please

  • ohh and i have the ios app and it doesnt work… it keeps giving me the same crystal over and over and it is useless

  • I bought killzone. Battlefield 4 and knack for launch. Knack has been my favorite. Bravo. Please let us get a sequel. This is the new kameo.

  • Knack is awesome…

  • I’ve actually put this off until last for PS4 games that I play. Trying to finish up Resogun (just need the 15x trophy) and the KZ: SF campaign trophies, then I’ll probably dive into this. But I may also wait until we get the app on Android. And come on, like someone else said, we need the Android version first or simultaneously. Apple is no longer dominating. Sure, the iPhone is the single highest seller, but for overall market share, more new phone sales are Android OS. Companies shouldn’t keep ignoring us or making us second fiddle. We should be front and center.

    Either way, not letting the reviews get me down. Really looking forward to playing this, and I hope the kinks I’m reading about here can get patched before I dive into it.

    PS: Knack lovers, feel free to send me a friend request, but please, leave a note letting me know that you’re from here. Blank requests usually get deleted/blocked.

  • Like others, no Android version of Knack’s quest is a huge disappointment. I already collected all the crystals and gadgets now so the whole Android opportunity is gone now.

  • Thank You Mark for the great game and for your input on the Greatest Console ever. I Love my PS4 so much. Thank you for giving me my second wife ;)

  • “It’s wonderful to see the response”

    Really, Mark? You love the bad reviews and very little sales?

  • Despite Knack not getting stellar reviews, it is actually the funnest PS4 launch title I have played so far.

    When I got my PS3, I played Ninja Gaiden Sigma. That game had some tough parts and enemies. You really had to know your enemies. IMO Knack plays similarly. For the most part, you can’t just go running into a room full of enemies and recklessly smack away and expect to get out squeaky clean, you have to plan it out and anticipate the enemies attacks. Once I understood this concept about the game, I enjoy it much more.

    Also the visuals! The gaming media has suggested that Killzone SF is what you show people for the eye candy, but I beg to differ. The textures and lighting in Knack is extremely well done and polished, and a lot of it is photo realistic.

  • (stupid 1250 character limit)

    The one thing I wish was more clear from the start, was swapping gadget parts with buddies. It wasn’t until I was already half finished with the game did I decide to look it up. I’m still on my first playthrough, and now that I know that I can choose which gadget part I want, I already have a couple really neat gadgets that make a huge difference, like the combo meter, relic detector, and the double battery.

    Anyway, I think the game is great. One thing i would like to see is the ability to manually save. Too often I quit the game, thinking it would start me off where I would if I died, but found out that I had to do nearly the entire level over again. Killzone did this as well, and I sure hope this lack of game saving doesn’t become the norm this gen.

  • @ leukoplast: I think the lack of checkpoint saving is due to the planned implementation of the standby/resume for gameplay feature that wasn’t ready at launch. I fell victim to that presumption when playing Killzone as well. It really sucked having to replay almost an entire chapter on Hard on my first run through the game. Hopefully Sony will get this feature rolled out soon. But I’m betting cross-gen games don’t have this issue as they have to be designed with the PS3’s limits in mind.
    Of course, checkpoints aren’t the same thing as a regular in-game auto-saving feature. I think they’ve historically been for spawn points when playing, not for starting the game on a fresh boot, so there’s that possibility as well. I think we’ve just gotten so used to auto-saves at checkpoints that we assume all checkpoints are going to auto-save.

  • @63 I’m sure they are working hard to make one. but at least be allitle happy it’ll be late that will just mean it will have less bugs and errors then the IOS versions when they where released.

  • Two More trophies and i get the platinum trophy.. i wonder if knacks adventures will continue in a sequel? he has much potential….

  • I love Knack!
    Great game. Contrats!

  • *Congrats

  • Hey Cerny, great network code on PS4. It half works half the time, yet always keeps me signed in! To do nothing!

    Even Resogun won’t boot up.

  • Diamonds spawn rate takes just a little modification. What would be really interesting to have patched in is Multiplayer versus mode. I’d love to have an arena battle against 23 other Knacks all rolling up in the air.

  • It’d be nice if you’d patch gems so we wouldn’t get more than necessary to complete Knack’s costumes.

    If we play through multiple times, why punish us? Bad enough we have to re-earn the gadget pieces on a new game.

  • any way we could get a demo for this for those who are curious but haven’t decided whether or not we want to spend the money on the game to find out? thanks!

  • Never had one problem with this game its great.

    Can you please add me if you play knack so we may be able to help collect everything thanks.

  • Reviews were so bad of this game that I would actually EXPECT to see a demo… People have to try it… They try it, they will buy. I think it could be a good move by Sony. I certainly wasn’t part of those bad reviews. I really enjoy it… Played through it with my son on easy, halfway through on normal mode (myself) and replaying it with my son… So yeah, can’t get enough of Knack… Really a fun game. It has it’s flaws here and there, but what game doesn’t?

  • Just downloaded the Android version of Knack’s Quest and there is a big ol’ bug in there. When tapping on the chest to see the new item or looking into the item list the game crashes. Sent a report when it happened and several others who are in a group on Facebook have the same thing happening.

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