Clockwork Knight

About Clockwork Knight

Clockwork Knight (1994) is Sega's early 2.5D Saturn platformer in which a clumsy toy soldier sets out to rescue a clockwork princess, a launch-era showcase that later helped inspire Grand Theft Auto.

Clockwork Knight in Depth

In the vein of Mario and Sonic, it is a side-scrolling platformer, but it uses pre-rendered 2D sprites of high-resolution 3D models, like Donkey Kong Country, on top of fully 3D levels and bosses. Pepper attacks enemies and opens passages with his key: a quick tap thrusts it out and repeated taps twist it for a more powerful attack. He can also pick up stunned enemies and objects such as footballs and springs and throw them, including upwards. Each stage must be finished before the time limit or his hit points, usually three, run out, and with no checkpoints, dying sends him back to the start. The 13 levels span Betsy's Room, Kevin's Room, the Kitchen and the Attic, each with two normal levels and a fully polygonal boss, plus a final boss; between worlds, Soltia the perfume bottle runs a shell game where Imperial Crowns can win extra lives.

Sir Tongara de Pepperouchau III, "Pepper", is a clumsy toy soldier and something of a laughing stock, in love with Chelsea, the Clockwork Fairy Princess whose voice wakes the household's toys every midnight. When she is stolen and lesser toys are hypnotised into minions, Pepper and his rival Ginger set out to find her, since without her voice the toys will never live again.

Making Clockwork Knight

Producer Noriyoshi Oba said it took over a year to make, speeding up considerably once the toy setting was chosen, and freelance artist Masayuki Hasegawa designed its FMV. Sato kept a side-scrolling format because of the Saturn's limits on rendering many polygons. It came out in Japan on 9 December 1994 and as a launch title in North America and Europe in May and July 1995; producer Dante Anderson explained the harder Western versions by saying Japanese players like to finish games quickly, Americans want more challenge and Europeans tougher still.

Critics praised its graphics, responsive controls and scaling effects but found it unoriginal, too easy and too short; EGM's reviewers felt the 3D was "practically shoved down your throat", and Maximum said everything in it had been done before in 16-bit games. It sold an estimated 157,775 copies in Japan by November 1997, and about 36,000 in the US during 1995. Clockwork Knight 2 followed in 1995, but a puzzle spin-off and a GameCube continuation, Knight N' Knight, never appeared.