Visual communication in the Witness

The Witness uses lots of framing and and use of color and visuals throughout its levels to often give the player hints about what the puzzle is and how it works.



In the example above, we can see a screen puzzle that we need to solve. The question about this puzzle is which ending does the starting line go into. While, the puzzle itself will leave us with no clue we can however look into the background where we will see pink trees except for one tree that is green and has a lone apple on its branch. If we follow the line to the apple that same branch is the same branch on the puzzle that is the correct answer to the puzzle.



In another example we can see the Witness making use of symbols in order to give the player the answer to this puzzle. While the puzzle once again gives no clear answer of how to solve it and however you draw one side the other side is drawn. While this might be initially confusing after you look into the background you can see that this panel is see through. We can also see rocks and their reflections that line up with a way to trace the rocks on the puzzle in a mirrored way. We can see the rocks acting as symbols for the answer to the puzzle as well as a nice island decoration.