The Witness Review

By -

I have an un-popular opinion on The Witness.  I really didn't like it that much.

I keep seeing it be lauded with praise but I found the core of the game frustrating and boring at the same time.

You see, The Witness looks like it's going to be a gorgeous game of exploring a beautiful island.  And in a way it is.  And I love that part of the game... I wanted that to be the game.  Exploration is a huge motivator for me in the games I play.

But The Witness, at it's core, is a series of line puzzles.  They come in different shapes and varieties but the whole game is line puzzle after line puzzle after line puzzle.  I was bored of it so fast.

I honestly would have had more fun with the game if every puzzle were able to be solved by a simple left click.  That way I could have wandered the island to my heart's content.

I even held out hope to the very end that maybe the ending of the game would tie the story of the island together and give me some narrative payoff.  If it had I wouldn't be writing this review the way I am.  Instead, it was a letdown.  Even after getting both the normal ending and the secret ending.

In the end The Witness was just line puzzles for the sake of line puzzles and that's really sad for a player like me.  I feel like the 3D exploration could have been it's own game.  The line puzzles could have just been a mobile app or something instead.

I know people out there really love this one, but I don't.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Latest Board Gaming

By -
Image
Besides video games I also regularly play board games when I'm hanging out with people face to face.  My brother, my wife, and I end up playing a lot of 3 player board games, but sometimes we get other players involved too. I realized I haven't talked much about what I've been playing in the world of board games, so here goes: Ticket to Ride - We own 3 different base versions of Ticket to Ride, 2 expansion sets, and an extra map set.  We love this game.  This is the game that gets the most overall table time when I'm playing board games with friends.  It's super accessible but still holds fun for people who have been playing the game for a long time.  I recommend this as a great beginner board game for anyone. Masquerade - A hidden role game where roles are constantly switching hands.  You're limited in actions on your turn and can only take one action.  This means that a lot of the time you're not entirely sure what role you currently have.
Read more

S2E22 - E3 2017 - “Who doesn’t want to be a dinosaur?!”

By -
E3 Hype! E3 2017. Not comprehensive. Not VGNN.  Only talking about things we think are interesting enough to talk about.  You have video game news sites for the rest :) We’re talking about Press Conferences, if more news comes out throughout the rest of the week it won’t be here because we’re recording on Tuesday night! http://e3recap.com/ has been my friend Overall trends Esports being forced onto games that aren’t even out yet “Influencers” being put front and center BJ: torn on the current “influencer” boom. Feels like a bubble that’s totally disingenuous Shorter press conferences with less big game announcements Really hard to tell what is actually exclusive Microsoft “Console Launch Exclusive” Most of these press conferences would have been better pre-recorded as just a series of trailers instead of having a stage show, honestly. Updates on games we already knew existed.  This is what we get for so many years of announcing games way ahead
Read more

What is Blaugust? 2023 Edition

By -
Image
I jumped right into the previous post without actually explaining Blaugust.  So... what is it?  Blaugust is an excuse to get people blogging... in August.  Hence, Blaugust! I'm not the best person to pitch it, but Blaugust is put on by a long time friend of mine, Belghast.  Here's what he had to say about Blaugust for the 2023 kickoff: Blaugust is a month-long event that takes place in August each year that focused on blogging and other serialized content. The goal is to stoke the fires of creativity and allow bloggers and other content creators to mingle in a shared community while pushing each other to post more regularly. For years blogging has been dwindling, and in part, Blaugust was my attempt and reversing that course by compiling a bunch of veteran bloggers in one place and making it super easy to ask questions and get answers. The idea is that this festival of blogging can help reignite dwindling fires for the next year and give folks a sense of kinship as a result. Ea
Read more