I started the The Witness with no knowledge as to what the game was about, other than looking at a few screenshots and understanding that it had some puzzles. I also saw the ratings it had were sky high but I didn’t want to spoil the game by reading into it.

You start in a tunnel, not having a clue about what is going on or where you are. As you emerge, you find yourself on what appears to be an island. The graphics are absolutely stunning and you are beset with a few puzzles to engage your brain.

Expectations are already high from the ratings and the beginning really accentuates that. Graphics are absolutely lush and the puzzles excite me. Who am I? Where am I? And what is this island that I can’t wait to explore?

All these feelings and emotions flood nostalgia into me as I remember back to being a kid and sitting with my dad as we experienced the beginning of Riven (Myst 2) together.

Did you ever play Riven or any other Myst game?

It had a similar feel to this game except you uncovered the story as you went through and it was extremely difficult. After the first hour, The Witness feels like a shit version of that.

That’s right, I’m cutting to the chase because the games does the same to you. Once you’ve admired the graphics, because they are stunning, you come to realise that this puzzle you’ve been solving doesn’t change. It’s just another variation of itself, in more difficult and demanding alterations.

Everyone’s played that line game on their phone. The one where you have to connect the dots up to each other. Well The Witness is very similar; you essentially draw lines from one side to the other, following rules that you need to figure out as you go along.

Now I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with a puzzle game. For me they are the perfect time wasters, ideal for travelling or when you’ve had a hot curry and need to spend the next half hour on the ceramic throne. Puzzle games are essentially about challenging yourself. This game certainly brings that to the table but the disappointment lies in the fact that it does fuck all else.

You get lured into this sense of wonder and anticipation but it never delivers on these emotions.

Once you solve a few puzzles, you move onto find the next set; you solve them and then next set. You begin to realise that this mysterious island offers nothing but beauty. Like the gorgeous pageant girl that you can’t take your eyes off, until she opens her mouth and you realise there’s nothing inbetween her ears.

There is no story to uncover, nothing actually happens when you solve the puzzles except more puzzles behind the next door and there’s absolutely no interaction with anything else on the island. You are literally wandering around looking for the next screen to play with. Imagine going on holiday to an exotic island and when exploring, you occasionally stop to play some Sudoku on your phone.

Some of the puzzles are hard and fun, but many of them are just annoying and there’s actually a few that make you feel sick, the way they move and the colours flicker, it’s a good job I’m not epileptic or I would have been cutting shapes on my living room floor.

One of the positive points is that the puzzles in a few cases actually have some relation to the environment around you, I won’t spoil it because learning how to solve a puzzle is the major focus rather than the actual solving itself. However, once you know what you’re doing in a certain area, the environmental aspects just become a tedious bore that you could do without.

All in all, The Witness was a huge disappointment for me, I longed for it to end just so that something different would happen and I’d find out what this was all about. That disappointed me either further. I just felt cheated throughout the whole game as I encountered more and more of empty nothingness.

Final Thought

If you love puzzle games, stick to the freebies on your phone because this game is essentially an app with a beautiful 3D reskin. Don’t waste your money, just wait for some one to rip the puzzles off and offer them on a hand held device.

Extra Note: After a little googling I discovered that there are 3 potential endings but that would involve starting the game all over again.

Can I be arsed? …No.