Progress!

On Friday we officially reached the Puzzle Complete milestone. This means that all puzzles that will be in the game when it ships are in the game now.

It does *not* mean that the game is done. We still have a lot to do! But it *does* mean that the nature of the work changes and becomes simpler, because we don't have to be making high-level creative decisions any more. It is now much more about turning the finish-the-game crank (making sure stuff plays well and polishing it up) for anything related to game design, modeling and texturing.

There are a few categories that still need creative decisions (story stuff, the menu system, etc), but for those of you who are awaiting the game's release, this is pretty good news.

There are currently 677 puzzles in the game. That number might be slightly different when it ships (we might cut a few, for example!)

124 Comments:

  1. Congrats! ready for another mind blowing experience! you guys are the best

  2. Great news!! I’m very excited to play the game!!

  3. The game is no longer on the “Coming Soon” section of the PS4… At least it wasn’t last night.

    • I wouldn’t be surprised if they took it off just because we have been “Coming Soon” for so long!

      • Is it actually “Coming Soon” or will we have to wait more than a few months yet? I really can’t wait to play your game and I hope it comes out ASAP! :)

      • Jonathan, when you get closer with the Witness, please open up a pre-buy account so all of us can assist you in funding your next project. It could get you a nice infusion of funds to get it rolling.
        Keep up the good ideas and inventiveness that keeps real gaming alive.

        DB

  4. I just had a horrible thought…:

    WHAT IF THE WITNESS IS TERRIBLE?

    … nah – IMMPOSSIBURU!

    • Looks gorgeous but the puzzle part doesn’t seem particularly interesting from what they’ve shown. I wasn’t a fan of myst but I love braid so hoping for the best. Regardless of how fun it ends up being, I have a lot of respect for the level of craftsmanship evident in Jons work, so even if it’s not my cup of tea I’m sure it will be worth checking out. Good luck with the final push guys, there’s only one way to end the pain. Ship it! ;)

      • I think maybe you haven’t really tried to connect with the puzzles, I think if you try to engage with them more critically, you’ll relate to them more. First of all, the puzzles that they have shown are .5% of the game or something. Second, even at the simple level with which they have to start out, the puzzles each seem to convey a little narrative. With the puzzles of separating the black dots from the white dots, there’s an element of segregation and a desire for homogenity. With the dots you have to go through, there’s an idea that a situation where you could normally approach from multiple angles is limited. That’s a little phony, though and not what I really feel. With the symmetric puzzles, I have nothing to say despite that those look like they would feel really nice to play around in.
        That’s all that’s on the internet so far, and it’s only an extremely tiny portion of what it has to offer. The game first appealed to me because of its sense of mystery, scale, and percieved simplicity.

  5. Really looking forward to this game. I’m sure the time spent developing will pay off in the end. Please don’t keep us waiting too much longer.

  6. Frederic Pinotello

    I wonder how long it will take you to actually sell the game as soon as you have finished development completely. You still have to do administrative stuff then, not? I also wonder in which price segment the game will sell. Is it like 20$ or more like a 50$ game?

  7. Congratulations on hitting puzzle lock! Long time follower here: I can’t wait to be the first to play through the game and write up a review of it.

  8. I love hearing the good news. The team there makes astounding progress every single day, so it’s always satisfying to get to declare a win like this. Good work. Excited to get to see the outcome.

  9. Hi Jonathan.
    Do you already know, how much the Game will cost? I mean will it be 70 € or 10 €??? Or Dollar if you want.
    Thanks for reply

  10. Thanks for the Update guys.

    That´s easily my most anticipated game. Can´t wait.

    Stay awesome.

  11. hello.
    i have been following the game developement since 2012.. quite some time.
    im very glad that the game is going to come out soon.
    i enjoy puzzle games the most, and this game looks to be a treat for your eyes and brain.

    thank you for the hard work!

  12. I think that this will be something beautiful.
    Few things have influenced me so strongly to create as Braid has. I am ready for The Witness to again reform the significance of games to me.
    Thank you, guys!

  13. Thanks for the update Jon, but I think its time that you answer a question that a bunch of us have been wondering for far too long: WHEN IS “GAME 3” COMING OUT!!?!? :-)

  14. I would love to be a fly on the wall for the pricing discussion for this game… you guys seem to be in a fairly unique situation re: pricing. $20? $60? Lots of prices make sense.

    • it will probably be more than 20 for sure. Theyve spent alot of time on this game and I know they had to get loans to finish it so 20 dollars wouldnt make sense. I don’t know if 60 dollars is a good price point either though considering it is an indie game, most people don’t know what this game is and wouldn’t want to spend 60 on a unknown game. That being said I think it will be about 40 dollars which seems like a fair compromise between the two.

      • I would pay $50. It’s digital (very convenient) and an Indie game (yay! supporting indies!) so I think $50 would be fair.

      • Frederic Pinotello

        There are many games that you could take to make a comparison for game extent and price tag. For example Batman Arkham Origins is 20 euro and if I recall corectly it has been the same on release. And I would consider that as an AAA game. So I don’t think its fair to say that the witness (as an indie game) would be in no way 20 euro (because it possibly could be). I personally expect it around 25 euro. I’m not a specialist with market trends in gaming industry, but I feel like the game will make more profit if they price it lower.

    • I am also curious about pricing strategy for a game like this.

      Braid caused a big stink by coming out at $15 (pushing the upper limit of XBLA games at the time). Even before I played the game I thought $15 sounded fair. After buying it, I felt that $15 was a bargain. Yet people didn’t hesitate to complain.

      It’s fun to speculate about The Witness:

      Are there mandated pricing considerations from Sony?
      Is there a marketing plan to justify a higher price?
      Is DLC part of the plan in the future?
      Does the game have a super secret “twist” or is otherwise easily spoiled? I often wonder if the Let’s Play videos decrease sales for games like these.
      How are the various platforms (to include iOS later) matched up in terms of price?

      I would love to see any post mortems after launch about your game. Have fun finishing it up!

  15. 25 euro is $30 usd, which is half of the launch price for AAA games in the US. So I suppose $30-$40 would appeal to all types of gamers. Either way I look forward to the game.

  16. Happy Chinese New Year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  17. I guess you may have been asked this before, but for the ps4 version, are you planning on supporting the move controller? On the one hand, there’s not so many people out there with one, but I can imagine it controlling a little better than thumbsticks, especially for the panels. Looking forward to it!

  18. I hope we get a new update soon!

  19. I’m chomping at the bit to play this game! We need a new exploration-based puzzle game in the ecosystem really badly.

  20. Great! I am ready for another existential crisis. Bring it on!

  21. Thank you for taking your time to make a great game. It’s been hard waiting for it, but I will be much happier with a highly polished and truly finished game than I would have been if it were rushed.

  22. What was the final puzzle count when the game shipped? I don’t think anyone has found 677 puzzles in the game yet.

    Thanks for a great game.

Leave a Reply to Ben Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published.