I haven't had chance to play Knack yet but I can't help feeling like a lot of reviewers have totally missed the point. They seem to talk about boring content, only three attacks, secrets aren't really secret etc. Yet Mark Cerny himself said this was intended to be a family friendly game and I think it's succeeded well. Crash Bandicoot started with two mechanics, spin and jump. Mario had jump and run until he got a power up. Sonic again similar to Mario.
It's not really the enjoyability of the game I think is the issue here, or the complexity of the mechanics. When Mark talked about building a DS4 controller that made him feel like a child, so he had the experience of being a child using the DS4 controller, he that the ability to consider how a game could be built better to be family and children friendly and I think they succeed quite well. It seems Disney-like with lots of colours and the way the characters are modelled and hell, it might even be a good game. I'm gonna buy it.