Just to level with whoever has played it too, or whoever is interested in understanding what’s the deal with this game: you start up in an island full of puzzles. These puzzles unlock more places and more puzzles. There are some mysteries around: there are some people being turned into stone, some edification and some signs of actual people recently being here “designing” something.
You, the player, continue through this gorgeous island moving around and solving puzzles and you finish the game. The game then slowly undoes everything you did and leaves you in the same place where you started. The end.
This is The Witness’ equivalent of a “game over”. You totally missed the point.
Second approach: you pay more attention to your surroundings. You start thinking outside of the box. You start seeing puzzles everywhere and the game rewards you for it. You solve puzzles in the sand, in the sky, in the sea, in the disconnected but perspectively-connected boat scraps. You are hooked, because now these things are literally everywhere.
You find a secret room, with several videos that talk about the futility of knowledge, both scientific and dogmatic. They explain how everything is just facts that we’re trying to make up into patterns and knowledge but that it is not really there.
At this point, you’re playing a different game altogether. You are not playing a game for the puzzles. This is not a puzzle game anymore. It is an exploration game. You don’t pay attention to the shapes and the “story” to uncover. You pay attention to your surroundings. You go up in the mountains, deep in the caves to find more of this stuff. You check every corner, every perspective approach, and you are rewarded with beautiful clever things that the game has designed, especially for those looking for them.
And then you reach that room. The one that you unlock with the sun and the entrance, that takes you to a developers audio-credits room and hotel. You reach the end, and you see the true ending.
In this ending, you see Jonathan Blow (game’s designer) hooked in the same way as you are, but in real life, and almost frustratingly trying to activate and solve puzzles, but they’re not happening. You see the place around where probably the game was designed, and you recognize every pattern, every inspiration and you are just dying to solve those puzzles because you’re already used to that. You see them everywhere. The video is in first person view because this is not about Jonathan, it is about you.
Here is the great explanation that Extra Credits give to it:
In short, it is a deliberate use of the Tetris effect. You will start seeing these puzzles everywhere, and the game taunts you for it. It gets you in its grip, and there’s no way back. It is beautifully designed for these puzzles to be generic enough so that you will be seeing them everywhere. You have been the victim of deliberate game transference.
The beauty in all of this is that it is clever, deliberate, and subtle.
Here is a 100% speedrun, the current world record, in case you want to check what puzzles the game has for you: The Witness 100% in 2h 29m 34s by darkid.
And what about the mysteries?
Well, I did say this is not a puzzle game anymore, but an exploration game. They’re not there for you to solve. They’re there for you to see.
You’re free to give them an explanation, the game won’t do it for you.
Because, in the end, knowledge is what you make of the facts, not something in the world per-se.
