The Witness (PS4) Open-world puzzle game from the creator of Braid

[Shin-Ra]

The Witness first official gameplay trailer.mp4 - YouTube

The Witness: An Open-World Puzzle Game on PlayStation 4
+ Posted by Jonathan Blow // President, Thekla, Inc.

Hello!

We, Thekla, Inc., are a small independent development team located in San Francisco, California, USA. Our current project is a game called The Witness, where you explore a mysterious island and solve puzzles. Thematically, it’s a game about epiphany, that leap your mind makes when you instantly go from confusion to understanding.

The game takes place in an open world, so that you can go wherever you want.

For a puzzle game, this is nice, because it means we can include real puzzles that challenge and surprise you. In a linear game, if you get stuck on a puzzle, you are usually just stuck unless you look up the answer; this is why many linear games shy away from puzzles with non-obvious solutions. In The Witness, we can make puzzles as difficult or as subtle as we want, because if you are stuck in an area, you can simply go somewhere else.

However, we are not just trying to make hard puzzles. Some puzzles in The Witness are hard, but some are easy. However, even the easy puzzles are interesting, because every puzzle has a little bit of communication wrapped inside it. We work hard to make each communication as clear and interesting as we can. So when you work through a bunch of puzzles in the game, you have also experienced a flow of ideas, presented to you at a high density.

Unlike most open worlds, which try to be as big as possible, The Witness takes place on a compact island. You can run across the whole island in 1 minute 10 seconds, yet we have 25 hours of unique puzzle gameplay with no filler and no repetition. We have designed it so that wherever you are, if you want to change paths and go somewhere else, there are three or four different places to go, all within 20 seconds’ walk.

We have been working on this game for 3 1/2 years and we are finally coming toward the end of development. It really is the best game that we know how to make, and we look forward to delivering these experiences to you on the upcoming PlayStation 4 console.

You can follow along with development of The Witness at the game’s site: http://the-witness.net

[Grim Reaper]

This one doesn't interest me that much.

[MrNathanDrake]

It's PS4 exclusive.... and it looks like the type of game that will get great reviews.

[Shin-Ra]

Launch window exclusive.

Wish they showed more puzzle variety in the trailer.

[Shin-Ra]

Here's the most up-to-date overview shot of the island from the game's blog:

http://the-witness.net/news/2013/04/island-snapshot-9/



There's shots there going back years so you can see how it's progressed.

http://the-witness.net/news/2012/08/...-a-year-makes/

[Steelmaker]

No thanks! I'll reserve puzzle games for my tablet or phone. Not wasting time on games such as this in front of my 60" HDTV.

[Shin-Ra]

In case you hadn't noticed, traversing the rich island environments is a big part of what differentiates this from the average puzzle game.

That's not going to be very immersive with touch-only controls and wonky graphics or performance on a tablet or phone.

[Shin-Ra]

First time I've seen this demo'd!

Jonathan Blow Explains A Puzzle From "The Witness" - YouTube

At a PlayStation event in San Francisco, Jonathan Blow walks us through one of the puzzles from his upcoming game The Witness. This is one of the early puzzles from the game—it gets much more complex from here, but this area gives a sense of the "puzzle vocabulary" of the game. The Witness will be out on PlayStation 4 sometime in the first half of 2014.

[Elandyll]

Havent hear much about the game for almost a year, and it was one of the focus during the big reveal...

Apparently the game has now entered "crunch time", which means we might see it before the end of the year.

http://the-witness.net/news/

Getting Things Done
By ORSI SPANYOL | Published: AUGUST 15, 2014

Just wanted to do a quick post saying that we are all working hard on the game, figuring out some of the last unknowns and polishing things up. We are definitely in finish-the-game mode, that’s why the posts have gotten more rare. Here is a shot of the finalized hub area I first posted about in the beginning of the year, to tide you over:

[jsteinhauer]

Every time this comes up, I think of MYST. I hope it's that good.

[Groo The Perverted]

Originally Posted by Steelmaker

No thanks! I'll reserve puzzle games for my tablet or phone. Not wasting time on games such as this in front of my 60" HDTV.

Yes, because clearly this is the same as playing Candy Crush.

Some people...

[Elandyll]

Jonathan Blow has tweeted a few times over the week end (and 'll pass on the stupid Polygon controversy. that would give them clicks that they shouldn't get).

We learn that The Witness has entered Closed Beta and thus nearing completion status, and that while the final game should be (estimated) between 25 to 50h long, Blow was able to speed run it in 6 hours which -for a speed run- is actually remarkably long.









The problem that occured is of course that it looks like some people don't understand what a Speed Run is and are taking this at face value to estimate the time to complete the game, which it is NOT.

[Elandyll]

New trailer and finallya release date: January 26th 2016.

Man... All those games not making 2015... NMS and Rime next?

The Witness - Release Date Trailer | PS4 - YouTube

Thank god for Bloodborne Dlc, Battlefront and SOMA (and JC3 unless it too gets delayed).

[jsteinhauer]

I was trying to find out something about this, but could not remember the name, and had no luck. It's been a long time since we've heard anything.

[richieb1971]

So disappointed they missed their target release date.

[Derb]

Originally Posted by Elandyll

New trailer and finallya release date: January 26th 2016.

Man... All those games not making 2015... NMS and Rime next?

The Witness - Release Date Trailer | PS4 - YouTube

Thank god for Bloodborne Dlc, Battlefront and SOMA (and JC3 unless it too gets delayed).

Ah yes.. Rime ..make it so.. Hopefully better then Wander.

[rajeevalone]

The Witness Review

[rajeevalone]

currently 88 in metacritic..

ign and destructoid gave 10 ..

[Trace17]

Witness thread here: https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=215289 Thread moved.

I guess it wasn't posted but the game will be $40 USD. It's packed with puzzles though. I do really want to play it, but might wait a bit for the physical copy (I have a lot to play right now anyway lol). I read somewhere that they're waiting to make sure there isn't any game-breaking bugs that need patching before putting it on disc, so it will be a bit after release.

[THE_FORCE]

I've been playing for a few hours and the puzzles, at least initially, appear not too bad.

As far as value for money goes, I reckon this is going to take a while to complete (obviously without a guide), so should be worth the asking price.