A Game You Think Had The Best Graphics or Art Style

Released in 2016 after a long and arduous development process where development restarted multiple times, The Witness was Jonathan Blow's long awaited follow up to Braid which was an indie game hit in 2008. The Witness takes place on an idyllic island that is essentially the manifestation of Zen.

The Witness is without a doubt a controversial game for the simple reason that most players either love it or hate it, there are few that find themselves in the middle. In terms of the art style of the game it is undoubtedly a work of art. The island itself is extensive, and can be overwhelming at first but the more time you spend exploring it the easier it becomes to find your bearings. The landscape is semantically divided into zones each relating to the core mechanic of the game.

The Witness is a game about drawing lines connecting two points. The very first panel puzzle you encounter is simple, you draw a line from one side to the other, from "circle" to "nub" as some players have commentated. The complexity of these puzzles grows as you explore the island, from additional coloured blocks that need to be segregated by the line, to icons that need to be paired, dual line symmetrical and asymmetrical puzzles, and even panels that incorporate the environment and ambiance into their solutions requiring the player to pay attention to the visuals and audio of their surrounding.

The puzzle element takes a giant leap when the player eventually experiences an "ah-ha!" moment which is fun to see when watching playthroughs of this game, some experience this moment relatively early whilst others don't until quite late. The meat of the story in The Witness however comes from audio logs, little cassette tapes scattered around the environment, easily missed at first. These audio logs provide many quotes for the player to ponder and shape the unfolding narrative. There's a lot more to explore if you are attentive, with multiple endings the game is very much tailored to the player's style of gameplay, how little or how much you want to do is up to you.

I was tempted to put this as the environment I would like to live in but ultimately decided against it for the simple reason that although I spent many hours playing this game, once I had actually completed it in its entirety I haven't gone back to replay it with any great deal of success. I dip in occasionally, get about a half an hour into the game and then leave. I can understand why some people don't like this game, if you're not invested in the story or if you have played it before and already completed the narrative there's not much else driving you to follow through. That's both a criticism and a critique of the game though, criticism in that it can be argued as a shortcoming, and critique in that clearly this is actually intended by the developer, there's a few moments in the game where it's quite explicit that it's trying to tell you to walk away from the puzzles and take a break and touch grass.