- Finally, after 10 years... - 17 June 2026
The Witness was released in 2016, ten years ago... how time flies!We've been working hard that whole time, and can happily announce that the successor game is almost done, and there's a free demo on Steam only during NextFest. It's called Order of the Sinking Star and you can get the demo here (but don't tarry too long as it goes away on Monday morning!):
- Braid Anniversary + Witness Bundle - 6 July 2024
Earlier this year we released Braid, Anniversary Edition, a remastered version of Braid with a bunch of new levels and tons of developer commentary. Now Braid Anniversary is on sale and The Witness is in a bundle with it. Both games have a base discount of 75%, but if you already own The Witness, Braid Anniversary will be cheaper, and vice versa, and of course you get the extra discount if you get both. Braid, Anniversary Edition The Witness Thanks for reading this! As we finally enter the downhill slope of design on the (not yet named) giant new puzzle game, it's nice to be able to go back to games like The Witness and make them a bit cheaper. It's been quite a privilege to have both of these games so well-received. (And we hope to have the new game ready for you on Steam before *too* long!)
- Another Update for the macOS version - 1 June 2023
Fixed a crash on some modern macOS systems that was was caused by an outdated Steam SDK.
- Hotfix for macOS 10.13-10.14 - 19 May 2023
Fixed crash on macOS versions before 10.15 that got introduced in the recent update.
- Hotfix for the macOS version - 18 May 2023
Fixed crash on macOS versions before 11.0 that got introduced in yesterday’s update.
- Update for the macOS version - 17 May 2023
Updated the macOS version to run on macOS 13+ Added the required signatures to prevent Gatekeeper pop-ups on macOS 10.14+ Improved trackpad detection code on macOS. Fixed that left-clicks on trackpads were sometimes incorrectly interpreted as right-clicks on macOS. Fixed that launching The Witness on newer macOS versions showed a popup about monitoring input from other applications.
- The Witness goes free on the Epic Games Store for two weeks - 4 April 2019
Whether you feel that The Witness is slightly or enormously pretentious, three things are undeniable: It contains a lot of puzzles, it’s lovely to look at, and it’s the Epic Games Store’s new fortnightly giveaway. Developed by Jonathan Blow’s ( Braid ) studio Thekla, it’s part Myst , part jumbo puzzle book. In the game, your sole method of interaction with its lovely landscapes is to draw lines, mostly on strange high-tech signs, featuring unwritten rules that must be wordlessly intuited. You can grab the game here , and see a trailer and some thoughts below. (more…)
- How The Witness fooled us all with a postmodern bait and switch - 27 September 2018
I love The Witness . It s a great game. But the more I play it, the more I m sure that Jonathan Blow was taking the mick out of everyone with it. In an interview with The Guardian , he said he wanted to make video games for people who read Gravity’s Rainbow. Widely considered to be Thomas Pynchon s magnum opus, Gravity s Rainbow made TIME magazine s list of All-Time 100 Greatest Novels. Pynchon s book is a great big amalgamation of beautifully messy imagery that leaves you absolutely clueless as to what actually happened by the time you put it down. Hm… Video essayist Joseph Anderson posted a video back in 2016, called The Witness: A Great Game That You Shouldn t Play . In it, he attempts to come to terms with Blow s shenanigans, but never quite does. What I found most interesting about Anderson s video was his focus on the fact that The Witness absolutely does not respect t…
- Jonathan Blow shows more footage of his new Sokoban-inspired game - 18 July 2018
Jonathan Blow, creator of Braid and The Witness, has shown more of his new puzzle game. It's a game inspired by (and even, it seems, codenamed) Sokoban, the old Japanese game about pushing boxes in specific orders to cover all the marks on the floor. Blow showed footage during his talk at Spanish conference Gamelab, which I popped along to a few weeks ago. It's taken a little while for the videos to appear online. In the footage, the viewer looks down into a leafy kind of compartmentalised level to see three characters and six doorless rooms. There's one big crystal which needs moving but when you move around, blocks pop up barring the way. What to do? That's the puzzle. Character abilities will help you out - in the video a wizard uses a kind of teleportation spell to move the crystal - and there's an undo mechanic to keep your experimentation swift. Read more…
- Daily Deal - The Witness, 70% Off - 6 July 2018
Today's Deal: Save 70% on The Witness !* Look for the deals each day on the front page of Steam. Or follow us on twitter or Facebook for instant notifications wherever you are! *Offer ends Sunday at 10AM Pacific Time
- The update has been published as the default version for all users. - 21 December 2017
This is the version that has been on 'future' for a while, with a few changes. 'default' and 'future' are now the same build of the game. Full list of changes versus the current public version: Added alternative "Click-to-Move" control scheme: Pause Menu -> Controls -> Mouse Control Mimics the touch controls from the iOS version with the mouse Left click to walk Left double-click to run Left click and drag to look around Right click to toggle in/out of focus mode Hold middle mouse or alt to strafe Remappable keys: Pause Menu -> Controls -> Customize Keys Remappable gamepad: Pause Menu -> Controls -> Customize Pad Ability to swap gamepad analogue sticks: Pause Menu -> Controls -> Pad Sticks Layout Fix to prevent players getting stuck after the rotating platform in the marsh Allow supersampling in fullscreen in High profile Improved early game control-hint UI Many small bug-fixes to art,…
- The update has been published as the default version for all users. - 21 December 2017
This is the version that has been on 'future' for a while, with a few changes. 'default' and 'future' are now the same build of the game. Full list of changes versus the current public version: Added alternative "Click-to-Move" control scheme: Pause Menu -> Controls -> Mouse Control Mimics the touch controls from the iOS version with the mouse Left click to walk Left double-click to run Left click and drag to look around Right click to toggle in/out of focus mode Hold middle mouse or alt to strafe Remappable keys: Pause Menu -> Controls -> Customize Keys Remappable gamepad: Pause Menu -> Controls -> Customize Pad Ability to swap gamepad analogue sticks: Pause Menu -> Controls -> Pad Sticks Layout Fix to prevent players getting stuck after the rotating platform in the marsh Allow supersampling in fullscreen in High profile Improved early game control-hint UI Many small bug-fixes to art,…
- Midweek Madness - Explorer's Bundle, up to 60% off! - 24 October 2017
Save up to 60% on great titles like Firewatch, Tacoma, Obduction, Samorost 3, Quern, and The Witness as part of the Explorer's Bundle during this week's Midweek Madness*! *Offer ends Friday at 10AM Pacific Time
- Mac Version is out, plus Sale This Week - 3 April 2017
The Witness is now available on Steam for the Mac. We sneakily put it up a week ago, but here's the official announcement. To celebrate the Mac release, the game is on sale for 50% off this week (for both Windows and Mac)!
- Mac Version is out, plus Sale This Week - 3 April 2017
The Witness is now available on Steam for the Mac. We sneakily put it up a week ago, but here's the official announcement. To celebrate the Mac release, the game is on sale for 50% off this week (for both Windows and Mac)!
- Now Available on Mac - The Witness - 24 March 2017
The Witness is Now Available for Mac on Steam! You wake up, alone, on a strange island full of puzzles that will challenge and surprise you.
- The RPS 2016 Advent Calendar, Dec 8th The Witness - 8 December 2016
It’s the end of another puzzling year in which plenty of things have made us scratch our head and frown so hard that we have permanent crease-marks in our foreheads. The RPS Advent Calendar highlights our favourite games of the year, daily, and behind today s door is… The year’s best puzzle game: blow me down, it’s The Witness . …
- NVIDIA Ansel Update - 22 August 2016
We have now updated The Witness with support for NVIDIA's Ansel imaging tool. We did this because Ansel adds a lot of interesting ways to take images from the game; because The Witness is highly visual, this should be some good fun. Capabilities include: * Super-resolution screenshots (waaaay higher than your monitor resolution) * 360-degree panoramic screenshots * Image tweaks for brightness, contrast, color control * Postprocessing filters To use this stuff, make sure The Witness is updated, that you are running a supported NVIDIA GPU (GeForce GTX 600-series or later; for a list of compatible GPUs, see http://www.geforce.com/hardware/technology/ansel/supported-gpus ), and that you have recent drivers for your NVIDIA GPU, then press alt-F2 during gameplay. The Ansel control panel should appear. When in Ansel mode, you get a bit of control to fly a free-floating camera around. So as not…
- NVIDIA Ansel Update - 22 August 2016
We have now updated The Witness with support for NVIDIA's Ansel imaging tool. We did this because Ansel adds a lot of interesting ways to take images from the game; because The Witness is highly visual, this should be some good fun. Capabilities include: * Super-resolution screenshots (waaaay higher than your monitor resolution) * 360-degree panoramic screenshots * Image tweaks for brightness, contrast, color control * Postprocessing filters To use this stuff, make sure The Witness is updated, that you are running a supported NVIDIA GPU (GeForce GTX 600-series or later; for a list of compatible GPUs, see http://www.geforce.com/hardware/technology/ansel/supported-gpus ), and that you have recent drivers for your NVIDIA GPU, then press alt-F2 during gameplay. The Ansel control panel should appear. When in Ansel mode, you get a bit of control to fly a free-floating camera around. So as not…
- Witness The Witness Remade In 8-Bitness - 6 June 2016
In the great tradition of taking something cool and then reducing it to its most basic elements while simultaneously challenging what made it cool in the first place, someone has made an NES version of The Witness It’s a curious thing, because at first glance The Witness is a game about tracing lines through grids so that you can trace different lines through different grids. In that pursuit, The Wit.nes seems to excel. …
