![]() ![]() The puzzles are just a conduit for this real lesson, a fun way of expressing this abstract idea through the logical language of programming code. It’s about understanding the process by which we learn new things. It’s not really a game about solving puzzles. The real point of the puzzle was to teach me a new way of looking at things, to open my mind to a new methodology. The solution wasn’t really the answer that I needed, it was meaningless without context. If I had just moved on I wouldn’t have been able to solve the next puzzle. It’s a good thing that I stayed and reverse-engineered the question from the answer because every subsequent puzzle in the Bunker/Greenhouse branched out from that one puzzle, building upon its trick. I had my answer, but I still didn’t understand the question, so I stayed at this puzzle, poking and prodding it until I found my missing piece. The next one unlocked for me so that I could move on if I wanted to, but I didn’t move on. My curiosity was piqued, so I looked at the solution too, which made no goddamn sense to me. A friend came in to help, got fed up, and looked up the solution, which made no goddamn sense to her. I was stumped by the Bunker/Greenhouse puzzles (don’t worry, there are no spoilers here) and by one in particular that seemed impossible given the rules as I understood them. The only sin is not understanding that solution. You’re not committing any sin against the game by asking for a hint or even for just outright looking up the solution. ![]() Unlearning a lesson is harder than learning one, and when we’re stumped like this, the truth is that it’s okay to ask for help. This is where an “easy” puzzle can become hard, when we’ve trained ourselves to think one way only to realize that that is the wrong way of thinking. What will inevitably happen is that you’ll solve a series of simple puzzles, and then you’ll try to solve the next puzzle in the exact same way that you solved the previous puzzles, only this time your solution won’t work. While, yes, this is true, that doesn’t mean those steps are easy. ![]() A common refrain in reviews of The Witness is the plea to solve each puzzle on your own, to not ask for help or look up solutions, that the game is designed to teach you things in ordered steps and that it is important not to skip a step.
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