Puzzles in The Witness
The Witness is an open-world, single-player puzzle game that takes place on a mysterious island filled to the brim with puzzles of all kinds. But, there’s a twist. On this island, there are no rules.
Well, not literally. The game is quite simple in terms of its mechanics. Use the WASD keys to move around, the mouse to look around, and left click to interact with the puzzles. That’s it. Nothing is there to give instructions on how to complete the puzzles. No text, no hints, no help.
Upon first hearing about this, the game seems like it would be impossible to complete. Solving puzzles without knowing the rules? Imagine doing that for something as complex as Sudoku or the like.
Just as a note, I will be showing a puzzle from the game along with its solution, though this particular puzzle and other similar kinds are some of the easier ones of an early area.
But the puzzles in The Witness are not complex, and its that simplicity that makes the game playable. Can’t rely on written rules but instead rely on the environment and my observations.
For instance, here’s an example of one of the earlier puzzles you can encounter in The Witness. Upon walking up to this semi-translucent panel, there’s just a grid with rocks protruding from the sea behind it. Once I click on the one of the large circles to the left, I’m controlling two lines: one top and one bottom, each mirroring each other. Upon closer inspection, this mimics the rocks in the background. The solution to this puzzle is to trace the outline of the rocks that appear behind the panel.
There are some rather obscure solutions that can only be seen when looking at a certain angle, but none involve much outside knowledge or mechanical skill to complete which is reflective of its very simple controls. It’s all about making observations and using that to figure out the rules.
The only thing really stopping me from making progress is my inability to figure that out, which technically could be overcome with a quick Google search for a walkthrough.
But I find that better than struggling over a puzzle that requires a mechanical skill that I seemingly don’t have at times.
