As far as I was concerned, the PS4 launched with two titles, Knack and Contrast. I'm not a huge first-person shooter fan, so Killzone didn't really appeal to me. Nor did the latest entries in the various sports franchises. After that, you were more properly left with upgraded PS3 titles. In short, Knack and Contrast were the launch titles that were obviously designed to show off the new system to new audiences.
And of the two, Contrast is clearly the better one even though you can realistically beat it in under ten hours.
By and large, I don't think that we should give Sony and Microsoft a hard time about the lack of good launch titles. Only Nintendo (And possibly Sega when they were still in the console game) could honestly be said to sport A-list launch titles because their strongest products are internally generated. When you have series like Mario and Zelda to draw from while you're building the new console, you have a ready-made bestseller to count on.
Playstation and XBox don't have that advantage, so the result is most people making their top selling titles don't have any idea what they'll be working with.
Knack was developed by Sony, which is apparent because playing the game is distinguishable from titles like God of War and Crash Bandicoot only by the backdrops. Not even that in some cases.
The storyline isn't overly compelling, with the supporting cast rarely rising above stereotypes and Knack himself almost completely devoid of the personal magnetism that gave Kratos his appeal. Though the graphics made you feel like you were in a Pixar film, each enemy is identical to it's counterparts with no attempt to add variation between models. On top of that, Knack's evolving abilities remain constantly situational, with exceptionally temporary and linear use.
None of this would have been much of a problem if the game was approximately half as long.
In video game world, longer is always better because gamers weigh in the cost versus the time spent playing it. However, it's becoming more and more apparent that quantity is being valued over quality. Games use tons of tricks to pad their play length. Nintendo is fond of making people play mirror worlds, or the same worlds with new characters to achieve perfect scores. Other games will make you walk back out of a dungeon you've just ran through rather than allowing for some kind of warp or alternate exit.
In Knack's case Sony really did try to avoid such things, but the result was a storyline that dragged on long after it was interesting. It was The Hobbit of games; long enough for you to notice major flaws that otherwise you would have barely given a passing glance to.
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