“The Witness” tells you nothing. There is no story in this game. There is no music. There is no character development, and there is no clear objective throughout the entirety of this game. Yet, “The Witness” has been one of my most memorable gaming experiences ever.

“The Witness,” created by Jonathan Blow and his team of developers, places you on an abandoned island, which initially had me completely confused. The rest of the game leaves you to figure out why you are on this island, and why the island is even there in the first place. This unearthing is done completely by your own measure; not a single other living person can be found on the island, and there is no narrator. At the end of the game, most of your questions will remain unanswered, but if you pay close enough attention, you may start building the foundation to your own theory as to why you are there.

It is impossible to find a definite meaning to this game, for good reason; everybody’s experience and takeaways are meant to be different. Jonathon Blow principally accomplishes this by allowing players to explore any part of the island they wish. There are no restrictions set on this abandoned place; the only restriction is one’s knowledge of the game.

Let us backtrack – what is the medium that the game uses to communicate its message to the player? What does one actually do in this game? “The Witness” is primarily a puzzle game. If you disdain that genre, I would recommend skipping the rest of this article, as “The Witness” is not for you. Throughout the game, puzzles are widespread. To reach the final scene, I had to solve around 300 puzzles. They are all variations of a simple maze puzzle, where you direct your mouse on a two-dimensional board from one side to the other. The puzzles become more complex as new rules and characteristics are added in each section of the game.

I found almost every puzzle, aside from a couple, to be fair and rewarding. There is no better feeling in this game than when you finally crack a puzzle that you have been working on for some time, completely blowing your mind. I vividly remember taking a break from this game every 30 minutes or so due to the sheer amount of times I had a “whaaaaaaat?” moment.

One important thing that you will have to learn in “The Witness” is the ability to walk away from a puzzle. The game’s open-ended design and the difficulty of some the puzzles may leave you stuck in confusion. When that happens, I found it refreshing to take a walk around the beautiful, serene island until the answer came to me.

Speaking of beauty, this game is drop-dead gorgeous. The art style
is breathtaking, and stunning details are hidden everywhere. Jonathan Blow cleverly designed some structures such that, if you look at them from a certain angle, they connect to each other in a striking and ingenious manner. Subtleties like this give this game a strange charm; you can tell Blow and his team worked hard and cared about the game’s quality.

One interesting note about “The Witness” is that it has no soundtrack. Blow included only two songs, which are in a special challenge section. A game with no music may seem odd, but upon further consideration, it’s a great design choice. The lack of music immerses the player in the game’s atmosphere – an eerie sense of loneliness. After all, the setting is an abandoned island. A soundtrack would only remove the player from the game, while excluding music makes the player focus on the sounds of nature. Moreover, sound is an important aspect of some of the puzzles, further justifying this design choice.

After reading about this game, you will probably have one of two impressions of it. The first may be that “The Witness” sounds like a classic case of pretentiousness; the main gameplay mechanic sounds straight out of a tablet game, and the game is lacking many fundamentals such as a story and sound. I cannot refute this, but I would still recommend “The Witness” to you, as the hundreds of puzzles, although simple in concept, induce much thought and pleasure.

The second impression might be one of curiosity, interest, and enthusiasm at the idea of exploring an abandoned island, and a readiness to spend 30 to 40 hours solving challenging puzzles. If this impression is yours, go out and buy “The Witness” as soon as you can. It may just become one of your greatest gaming
experiences.