The Witness is a single-player game in an sandbox world with dozens of locations to explore and over 500 puzzles (they all consist of tracing a path on a grid). Finally soft-locked myself today, I could possibly backtrack the 40 last puzzles to get out of this pickle (the game only has auto-save and it triggers every 60 puzzles done) but I'm tired, boss. This is the best intrisically and expertly designed worst game I've played to date. I believe it's a great work that aligns perfectly with what I've seen was the devs' vision. If I were to rate it as my own experience, however... if the naysayers shall brace for the pearly gates count me as one of those. I am not outright saying the game is too repetitive, too bloated and too sluggish... no, you are only reading between the lines...

I got to say that the utter lack of accessibility options is based. Anyways, using the environment for puzzles is more often than not smartly executed. It's just a matter of the game's essence filtering me once again. I solved a puzzle once and listened to a lady's documentary for 10 minutes her voice was very soothing and charismatic I give her a Backloggd 5 star rating pepega

Jonathan Blow strikes again! The Witness is the most meditative gaming experience I’ve had in a long time, and I’m sure it’ll have me dreaming about drawing lines on little grids for weeks.

It feels like a game designed for gamers and non-gamers alike. There’s no friction here – the only challenge comes from the puzzles themselves. At the outset, you awake on an island and almost immediately you’re solving your first puzzle – the first of many. The Witness’s puzzles involve drawing lines on grids to fulfill certain requirements. Some puzzles require you to draw Tetris-like shapes; others make you draw lines that separate white squares from black ones. Certain puzzles even incorporate the elements of the local environment into their solutions – light and shadow, soundwaves and reflections. I wish I could say more but I feel like I’ve already said too much.

The world design is also top notch. The island you’re stuck on is big but not too big. Navigating the environment is relatively straightforward; natural signposts are abundant and if you ever feel lost you can always hike to high ground and reorient yourself. Each section of the island has a different feel. Swamp, desert, jungle, derelict ship – though these environments are all interconnected, each functions as a discrete area, with puzzles that revolve around unique mechanics. Moreover, the openness of the environment meant I rarely got stuck. If one puzzle had me stumped, I could go work on another. This also led to plenty of “eureka!” moments, when I’d come back to a previously indecipherable puzzle with new knowledge and crack it immediately.

When I say this is a game for non-gamers, I really mean it. I suspect if I let my father, who hasn’t played a game seriously since the Atari 2600 days, take a crack at it, he could work his way to the end with minimal guidance. The underlying game design is quite basic and it makes no assumptions about what knowledge and experience the player may or may not have. The only assumption it makes is that the player is capable of recognizing patterns and extrapolating solutions from them.

After I’ve heaped all this praise on the game, why am I not giving it a perfect mark? The primary reason is the limitations inherent in the design. While the puzzles employ many different sets of rules, solving them always comes down to drawing lines on a grid. This isn’t bad – in fact, I enjoy it immensely! But I wouldn’t give a book of Sudoku puzzles 5 stars, and the same goes for The Witness. (And yes, I know there is more going on here than meets the eye. But the scavenger hunt aspect doesn’t particularly excite me.) Additionally, a few of the puzzles felt gimmicky rather than smart. A few unskippable late game puzzles feature intensely flashing lights. I’ll confess that I looked up the solution to one – just one – because my eyes were tired of looking at flickering neon colors. The rest of the 300+ puzzles I encountered in my playthrough I solved without the help of a guide.

No moon logic. No assumptions. No gamerisms. Just a collection of (mostly) no-nonsense puzzles spread across a lovely environment that’s easy to navigate. It’s not the be-all-end-all of video games, nor does it aspire to be. It’s a game that scratches a very particular itch and scratches it thoroughly indeed. While not flawless, The Witness is a very successful marriage of pure vision and clean design. If I had the opportunity to remake it, I would change nothing. (Well, nothing besides the obnoxious disco lights.)

Still a masterpiece of a puzzle game, it’s not until this recentmost playthrough that I understood how meditative and deliberately slow-paced the game is. Ramping up the speed on the boat to max is absolutely deafening and the game wants you to take your time. We live in a world that moves so incredibly fast and this game, with brilliant mechanics and challenges, encourages you to stop, look around, and peacefully live in the moment. There's also some really sick Metroidvania aspects where areas that are locked off early on stay locked until you get the "key", that key being your knowledge and ability to identify puzzle mechanics and solve them.

Dodges five stars because the mountain puzzles, among some others, can get really messy, and definitely should've stayed in the cave plexus.

After completing the “challenge” I was satisfied with the game and decided to write this review. I think this game is close to being a masterpiece of a puzzle game, but it does not excel in any other category, and that is fine.

I am amazed at how much the developers managed to do with such a simple mechanic, creating a whole game, with over 20 hours of gameplay, based on drawing a line from a circle to complete a puzzle (they probably went into rehab after making this). Going around the island I was always looking for more, seeing new twists to the puzzles, finding clever solutions thought up by the devs, not only using the tablets and the symbols, but also using the environment in so many different ways had me in awe. Truly a unique and refreshing experience.

Even though I did love the game I have to address it’s flaws. If you are expecting a story or a well written narrative, then you have come to the wrong place. The question of “why am I here and what is my purpose” always loomed in the back of my head. As I was traveling around I got some hints to a story, small bits and pieces, but nothing that really made me want to engage with it, so I never did. And after looking up the narrative online, I don’t think you should either, it’s not worth it.

One of the puzzles was a bit too abstract for me, and that is the shipwreck door, it has to be the hardest puzzle in the entire game(that I found at least), but luckily for me I was told this door was stupidly difficult before I even found it. After half an hour of jotting down sequences and trying to make sense of the sounds and the door, I gave up and looked up the solution online, and I still didn’t get it. After more research I found out the logic and I do respect the difficulty of the puzzle, but I can’t say it’s well crafted.

I do develop games myself so I can see why it wasn’t included in such a big 3D world, but a colorblind mode would have been great. Some of the environmental puzzles were actually impossible for me and the bunker and the epilepsy puzzles in the mountain were pretty difficult to get a read on.

To end it I have two personal tips to make the game a better experience. First of all is the addition of different people. I think having friends/family look at the puzzles and creating a dialogue around them makes for a fun and social experience of the game. I had people around for 50% of the game and I think that boosted my experience by a lot. Second is the use of your phone, especially with the sound sections. I filmed and slowed down the sounds of the birds to get a better understanding of the sequence and I think that was a must for actually enjoying the area.

allow me to be brutally honest

this was like a 9/10 for the first few hours
after that nope I check out man way too hard and way too obtuse for me

im sure this is like perfect to people who can figure that stuff out, and the actual presentation and flow of the game are immaculate, but this just ain't for me

maybe one day ... i'll finish this...

... ...
..
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The Witness is a game where you are thrown into a beautiful world of wonder without any explanation other than how to control your movement and how to use your mouse on the puzzles.

It's a game of puzzles that leave you scratching your head more than once, some may take you ages to figure out and some you get done quite fast. The game uses it's environment, among other things, to bring you these puzzles and it uses clever ways for solutions all the way to the end.

Whenever it gets too tough or even boring, you can just walk away and come back later! It's genius how you can just leave and visit another area to clear your mind, then come back to where you were stuck last time and figure it out finally with a clear mind.

The Witness is certainly an experience. A unique and refreshing one. If you're a fan of abstract puzzles and problem solving, there's much to love here, as I certainly enjoyed it. I just caution that a lot of what makes this game satisfying comes from your interpretation of it, not necessarily through the game itself.

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A beam of sunshine on your skin. I'll be candid, I thought this was really mid when I first played it - but I have not been able to shake its profound allure in the now over 4 years since that time. I'm still not fond of all its quirks: some of its of-the-era attempts at eccentricity grate (chiefly anything to do with its 'story'), there's still some tedium to be had, and much of this is definitely still too unnecessarily cryptic for its own good. But fucking hell... just LOOK at it. This is patently like, top five visuals of all time for this or any system. If there's one thing this exceeds at above all else, it's putting you in your own little luscious world and giving you all the time on Earth to bask in its otherworldly aesthetic. Imagine how your most cherished and beautiful memories look in your mind, this is what that looks like. Intricate and poignant in a way that I'm not even sure I fully grasp yet (if I ever will). A deeply meditative, unforgettable, affecting, and - in its own way - transcendent experience. I used to think it was artsy-fartsy, now it knocks my socks off every time. Maybe that's the point?

This game is amazing but I am never finishing it.

As far as puzzle games go this game has some extremely good ideas that makes for really enjoyable puzzles ramping up in complexity, and the simple choice to force you to figure the puzzle mechanics out on your own gives you a deeper engagement with the game that makes it fulfilling in a big big way.

... and I really just wish they were put into a more accessible game. For as much as I love it I just keep getting gated by that one puzzle that hits my brain limit. Some particular points are too insane for me and I keep finding a point like that no matter how many times I try to come back to this game, so it's a shame that I have to say this game as much as I enjoyed it isn't one that is getting finished. Like I said, I hope more puzzle games take inspiration from this one just more accessible, I may unfortunately have been too dumb for this one.

Line puzzles, and lots of it!

Puzzle is my favorite genre in games, and The Witness really satisfied my craving for it!

The goal of the game is you must activate 8 of the 11 lasers from each areas of the island that opens up the door at the top of the mountain at the center of it. Inside it will be more harder puzzles that incorporates all of the rules you've learned so far and see the ending sequence if you get to the final part (if you get all 11 lasers to work, you'll access something secret!).

There's no real story in this game, really. At best, the narration is a bit 'meh'. There are too many pretentious stuff scattered around the island in a form of voice-recorded messages. They offer nothing to the player.

But how does it play?

Well, you start the game inside a long cylindrical room, and at the end of it is a closed door with a panel that has a line on it, staring at you like it asks you to do something. So you interacted with it and connected the line, the door opens. You then enter through the door into what seems to be a dark cellar, and at the other wall is another door with the same panel, only this time the shape of the line is different. You connected the line again and the door opens.

Now you know the basic rules of the game.

You'll find panels like these all over the island in different shapes and sizes, beckoning you to solve them. The way it works is that you draw a line on the panels, guiding it around the maze from start to finish to activate the next panels if you succeed.

Seems simple enough, but each areas around the island introduces a new rule you must follow in order to solve these maze puzzles. If you don't satisfy these rules the puzzle will reject your attempt and you must try again. Some puzzles require out-of-the-box thinking, and some have multiple solutions. If you activated all the panels in the area it'll lead you to its laser, which you must activate to get to your goal.

There are also line puzzles you will find hidden around the environment in a shape of a circle connected by a long line. You must trace this line if you stand in the right spot. These are all optional and only affects the counter of puzzles you've solved in your save file.

That's everything, I guess! If anything, I think the point of this whole adventure is that there's no real reason to solve these puzzles, but it's our desire to solve them out of curiosity.

It sure tickled my curiosity! I enjoyed the whole journey of it from the beginning to the end. It's a 5/5 for me! The narration still sucks.