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Ars Technica

 

[Servbot24]

Polygon interviewed Blow.Really interesting preview. He talks about platform decisions, length of the game, puzzle/game design...

Sounds great.

I am in absolute agreement with fast travel. This is one of the reasons I like MGSV. Having to wait on the helicopter lends the world weight. I know there's a way to do actual "fast travel" with the box, but I don't want to do it. Once that happens, it changes from a character in a world, to a cursor on a map.

I also love that players are not expected to be able to finish the game. That's how it should be - 100%ing a game should be an almost mystical thing.

 

[FalsettoVibe]

Looks great!

 

[KainXVIII]

Looks really cool (too bad that The Talos Principle is already out for a while, it will be tough competition and comparison will be inevitable)

 

[Man-is-Obsolete]

Looks gorgeous. Ready to step into this game

 

[derExperte]

Lots of content means a big danger of ruining the pacing though.

 

[mckmas8808]

Dat MUSIC!

 

[NullPointer]

Alrighty then.

January it is.

 

[Auctopus]

I really hope all that dev time (and money) pays off.

 

[Barry Burton]

Man, and just when I thought Q1 couldn't be any more stacked than it already is.

 

[viveks86]

Damn, was expecting it to come this year. Now it's almost this year. I'll take it.

 

[Kalor]

I'm really looking forward to this. It's cool that they showed a bit on how the line puzzles can directly interface into the game world, I was curious how they would handle that.

 

[viveks86]

The art style is FREAKING INCREDIBLE. I'm going to get soooo lost in this world with VR.

 

[Zombie James]

80 hours? Didn't expect that...

 

[Elvin Atombender]

This looks fantastic! Finally the wait is coming to an end.

 

[Tregard]

What are the odds on VR support then?

 

[Nzyme32]

What are the odds on VR support then?

High, since Blow already posted blog stuff on VR and the Witness a long while back iirc. Although how that will all work now and on what platforms, I'm not too sure

 

[TheSpaceBetween]

So only two years after it's intended release date. At least it's coming though!

 

[Mikey Jr.]

The colours alone are gorgeous.

 

[xxracerxx]

Awesome, cannot wait to do some line puzzles.

 

[Nzyme32]

So only two years after it's intended release date. At least it's coming though!

Well the original intended release date was Christmas 2011, then that changed several times

 

[Vexidus]

I am kinda bummed out that the game isn't dropping sooner, but at least there is a definite date now. I am thrilled with the new stuff seen in the trailer, and this game is just amazingly gorgeous. Loved the music as well, and hope to hear more of that kind of celtic/nordic-tinged somewhat sombre modern classical that we had in Braid.

I still feel like we know nothing about this game, and have seen barely anything, which excites me a lot. I get the feeling that when we sit down and play this, there will be a ton of really unexpected and surprising stuff in it.

 

[CarbonFire]

Ars Technica

This line of thought uncorked a pretty lengthy monologue on Blow's part about puzzle design. It was the first time I'd realized how obsessive he is about the practice, and it proved to be a real statement of intent for what The Witness has to offer. "To be crassly manipulated purely for entertainment value, to be treated like this stupid game consumer, is about as far from what I want [in a game] as you can get. I get pissed off when a game treats me that way. To act that way as a designer similarly involves not having much respect for the player as an intelligent person.

"Some game designers will talk about making the player feel smart and having that be the important thing," Blow continued. "'We want everyone to feel smart, so we design things that aren’t actually very hard. We have them do what we wanted them to do.' I do not like that. Instead, I give people the opportunity to be smart for real. I don’t care if they feel smart. What matters is if they are. That leads to a very different game."

I appreciate this thinking, but it's damn risky in this market. I have a feeling this game will be pretty divisive. Hope it's great, and that it sells well for them.

 

[ultron87]

Bout damn time. I feel like I shouldn't have watched the trailer though. Kind of didn't want to know anything more about the game.

 

[TheSpaceBetween]

Well the original intended release date was Christmas 2011, then that changed several times

Oh was it? I must have been living under a rock.

 

[dangerskew]

Blow says he has "at least three games" that he's considering creating next. One of them already has a working prototype with 40 hours of gameplay, but he's not sure if that will actually be the next game he works on.

Dude sure loves making games.

Really excited by this news and can't wait to get my hands on the game. Art is gorgeous and the music is great.

 

[Nuke Soda]

I'll believe the date when the game is released. Game looks really interesting, but I am a little worried that it won't be an FPS, where are the enemies to shoot?

 

[TrojanBlade]

Dat music. Dat visuals. wow

 

[a secret-boss]

finally. PSVR would be greats

 

[silenttwn]

.

 

[Shadow_FFVI]

This looks stunning. Always did. Hope it's a resounding success for them.

2016 is looking to be one of the absolute best years in gaming. Sheesh...

 

[Azlan]

This looks beautiful. Cannot wait to get my hands on it.

 

[Fractal]

Game looks great visually, but those are some strong words.To me this doesn't seem like a type of a game able to provide 80-100 hours of playtime.

 

[John Kowalski]

Welp, looks like this will be too hard for me.

That's depressing. I guess i'll pass on it.

 

[Kaako]

The main reason I'm looking forward to this is because they seem to have actually taken their sweet time. Good things usually happen when devs are given that "luxury."

And it looks gorgeous as fuck, of course.

 

[StrongBlackVine]

Welp, looks like this will be too hard for me.

That's depressing. I guess i'll pass on it.

You never know if you don't try.

 

[DavidDesu]

Really looking forward to this. Braid was exquisite and made me feel like a genius. Blow seems great at designing a puzzle game that can teach you how to play as you go along and from all I've heard before The Witness is designed just like this.

It looks gorgeous and I can only hope it will be compatible with PSVR. It looks like a great fit for it technically as well as the playstyle of the game working well with VR too.

An indie game that could last for tens of hours of play. I'm in. In Blow we trust (the man, not that kind).

 

[AU Tiger]

It doesn't LOOK demanding in terms of whether or not my 980ti can pull off 4K 60fps but I've been wrong about these simple art style games before.

Either way, I can't wait to get it, get stuck 45 minutes in and then never play it again

 

[JetSetRadio]

Looks great, I hope it's not as boring as braid.

 

[GeoramA]

That's an awesome way to start off 2016. Can't wait!

 

[RedAssedApe]

january would actually be a good time. assuming some other devs dont smarten up after dying light sold hotcakes

 

[OneUh8]

nice. Very excited for this.

 

[inm8num2]

Great trailer - I thought this might come out around March, so January is a nice surprise.

 

[Haunted]

Beautiful.

That sure is pretty.

I'm still unsure about the game, seems to me that doing those line puzzles could get old. Will probably still get it though unless it gets unspeakably dreadful reviews (i.e. 7/10 amirite)

Well, the trailer gave a glimpse of two line puzzles that weren't really line puzzles, if you know what I mean.

I think there'll be less variety in the core puzzle philosophy than people hope for, but enough clever variations on the theme to keep things interesting.

 

[Saty]

The Witness attempts to solve this problem with a sort of unifying theme to all of its puzzles. Virtually every puzzle in the game takes place on one of hundreds of "panels" that are littered throughout the island. These panels often feature a grid of lines, and your goal is to draw a line on them from a specific starting point to a specific ending point.

To put it another way: All of the puzzles in The Witness are, in their most simplest form, mazes of some sort.

Aaand hype's gone. What a baffling choice for a singular puzzle design. 650 panels of drawing line after line after line after line.

However, with The Witness Blow seeks to fix "one of the things that's most broken about Myst and that whole genre of games." Namely: pixel hunting.

"Point-and-click games generally have some version of pixel hunting," he says. "You look at everything you come across and wonder, is this thing interactive or what? In Myst, you come up to some elaborate, beautiful machine, and you start clicking on different parts of it, and eventually you find the knob that you're allowed to turn

Utterly sad. There is no problem. The problem was fixed. Years and years ago. You press a button and you see all the interactive spots. Bam! no more pixel hunting.

This is a sad reflection of a part of P&C devs that are for some reason oblivious to this solution and still design their games on pixel hunting. Case in point, the highest-profile P&C title in years, Broken Age, has no Hotspot indicator and doesn't allow you to skip conversations.

 

[Fractal]

Looks great, I hope it's not as boring as braid.

Haha... yeah, me too. While Braid is a highly praised game which strongly influenced the indie gaming and pushed it into the spotlight, I never saw anything special. Forced myself to finish it, often consulting a walkthrough, but ultimately can't say I was impressed.

 

[nib95]

Finally! Will definitely be buying this. Can't wait. Now I just need RiME and No Man's Sky release dates.

EDIT: Finished the trailer. Looks stunning! And the music is fantastic.

 

[Cronen]

Day one.

 

[Gestault]

This whole experience is going to be nuts. I'm almost surprised how much underlying hype I have built up.

 

[qa_engineer]

YES. Sony's slow trickle of good news these past few months has been awesome.