Ratchet and Clank: A Crack in Time Offers New Gameplay Mechanic

Ars Technica has a great look at the latest installment in the Ratchet and Clank series, "A Crack in Time." Along with the great looking graphics and same great gameplay, A Crack in Time offers a brand new game mechanic: "time pads." Time pads allow you to make a copy of yourself and move through a series of action, then shift back to "real time" and interact with your past self. "It's a game mechanic that's hard to describe in words, and wrapping your head around it inside the game isn't much easier when it's first described with an example or two. You have to play with it and bend time to your will before you see just how ingenious the whole thing is. The puzzles begin simply and grow harder as the game moves on. The use of time is done very well and elevates what we've played of the game from another platforming experience to something truly special."

Comments

Cursor*10?

[KingSkippus]

When I read the description, the first thing I thought was that it was the little Cursor*10 flash game. Very cleverly done, it kept me busy for a while.

http://www.nekogames.jp/mt/2008/01/cursor10.html

Re:Braid & quick-save/quick-load

[interkin3tic]

Where... where what? Oh. He went back in time to finish the post.

Anyway, GP I think was referring to different mechanics that braid had that were not in POP. The "rewind time from death" was in Prince of persia before Braid. But Braid had pads on which you could stand and be outside of time or the rewind/forward time controls. In a seperate mechanic, Braid had worlds where you would do one thing, say jump down to a lower platform and hit a switch to open the door on the upper level. You then rewound time, door goes back closed, but when you let time go forward, a shadow form of you would redo the action you just did, you'd see the shadow jump down and open the door. You could then move through the door.

I never played prince of persia, but I was under the impression neither mechanic was seen in it.

The new rachet and clank sounds like it has a more complicated combination of both of those mechanics seen in braid

Even better are the time pads. You stand on one and "record" your actions in time. Then you stand on the other and interact with your past self going through its actions. In the simplest puzzles you stand on a pressure-sensitive switch for yourself so you can walk through a door. In the more intricate puzzles you have to record sections of your performances multiple times in a type of choreographed dance to get to where you're going, often using the time explosives in multiple ways.