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This video is deeply cruel, lol. I’m a fan of the Witness, and I solved the ship puzzle myself, so I have to ask: Did you even solve it yourself? Joseph was wrong with his conclusions, and you clearly don’t understand it either- you simply MUST interpret both audio channels separately to solve the puzzle. It’s not even a brevity thing, you took the time to explain it incorrectly, so you must just be a liar. The only thing you’ve revealed here is that, fundamentally, you’re a nasty person looking for someone to bully, and you’re willing to lie along the way if you think it garners you the clout-for-ammunition you need.

This is the first non-Chris-Chan-related RUclips video I've seen that operates with the same garishly malignant tone as an Encyclopedia Dramatica article lmao

Its interesting seeing this get personal for no reason, i would love to know why. That is a far more engaging puzzle for me than anything the witness can provide me lol.

Look, Joseph Anderson is impatient, less diligent in his editing than he should be as a video essayist, and at times even reactionary, but he is not fundamentally incurious. An incurious person stops when they find something that's not for them. He wanted to understand the gane, he just lacked some of the literacy necessary and did a subpar job expressing that. Beyond that, I'd say a lot of your points rely on pedantry, which isn't strictly off limits, but it opens all of your statements up to the same level of scrutiny, and frankly I'd say you're not operating on a much higher level than the person you're decrying.

Being at best passive agressive and at worst downright cruel and snarky is a sure fire way to make people disregard any valid points you may actually make.

"Like a fish with epilepsy, you can't even begin to grasp it" is BARS and you know it ma'am.

The beauty of game reviews is that they are meant to be subjective. A review would not convince you to buy a game if it only discussed the boring aspects. That being said, my issue with Anderson is that every time I’ve come across his review, he is very clearly closed minded, he comes into a game with a particular idea of how it should be, and it angers him when that isn’t what he gets. I find that he comes to a lot of conclusions that are completely off base even from a factual basis. I just don’t really like his videos. But lots of people do and that’s fine

34:55 I mean he's right, it's just like Dark Souls

yeah i only got to the part about the audio puzzles but you are so caustic and mean in that section that i found jt too unpleasant to finish the video.

49:19 or, if you listen to him, hes saying "in a simple way" or "in a complex way". This isnt gramatically incorrect, it gramaticaply aligns with his speech, it just strips it down a little for easy understanding.

Well, every video essayist needs that one video they made that they reference several years later as a "video I'm not proud of" and I guess you finally got yours.

36:21 you have soul-read mr anderson not just with regards to this game but with criticism entirely much to the chagrin of himself, his followers, and his maligned attempt at hedging that his "subjectivity is implied." For real though, 25 minutes for a video essay, max.

Not a very good video.

This is a great video! This book is still required reading in my ELA class, but our essay is about how innacurate it is

i don't like anderson, his video, or the witness very much, but i have the feeling im gonna dislike you much more than all of those things

This is literally "Subjectivity ISN'T Implied - the Video". I love good media criticism and critique, and I thin it's important to the creation of art that art be critiqued. Movie reviews are not presented as pure fact, that's why there's many different outlets that review the same movie that build a "consensus". You are fundamentally misunderstanding that a) Joseph's critique is purely opinion (literally what a critique is), and b) someone who disagrees with you because they literally aren't in the hardcore fandom and knows every single tiny detail about the game is just fundamentally wrong. For the record as well, you are so incredibly snobbish about every tiny word and phrase that you, too, refuse to look at the context, which for someone as big of a fan of The Witness as you are, is baffling. A RUclips video is not the same as a book - it does not demand perfect precision and should not. RUclips is a platform begging for people like you who will tear anything apart because the video didn't qualify a statement seven times to ensure that it's completely 'um actually' proof. RUclips is not a great platform for small creators so Joseph listing his books is not him saying he is so proud that he needs you to laud him with compliments, it's a way to keep him afloat. You didn't even look at the context of the Super Bunnyhop point by finding out that his colorblindness wasn't revealed until SEVERAL YEARS after Joseph's Witness critique came out. You refuse to acknowledge that multiple things can be true at once - a player can be frustrated at the outset by the central town, but later understand that the game is asking them to return later. You *are* the commenter who says "Well I had no problem with finishing Dark Souls so everyone else is just bad".

This video is in such bad faith. Why did you even bother to make it?

I genuinely believe that this video wasn't made with any deliberate ill will because I can't imagine anyone sane wanting to come across as this elitist and pretentious on purpose. I don't mean that as an insult or sarcastically, just as constructive feedback (that probably isn't needed 2 years after the video going up). I've noticed that most people in the comments here immediately jump past your arguments to criticize your tone (not that I blame them, this video was very hard to watch), but I think it's worth crediting that you do make some valid points in this video. I recently got the true ending in the witness and enjoyed the puzzles for the most part. Your arguments lost me when you started insulting the guy you're responding to and bringing up how clever you are for not struggling with puzzles. It weakens some otherwise strong arguments by making me (and judging by the like/dislike ration, many other people) much more focussed on how often you feel the need to insult another creator personally because he didn't rain neverending praise on a game you liked. It comes across less like constructive criticism and more like whining that he's more popular than you ("review channel with 600k subs" didn't need to be brought up)

Having watched Joseph's review myself, the claim made at 6:25 that, "he could not more obviously hate puzzle games" is flat-out incorrect. He has stated at multiple points that he actually enjoys the puzzles but has some criticisms about the pacing, difficulty curves, and the arbitrary moments that waste the player's time between puzzles. At 12:45, Joe doesn't ever imply that he's tone-deaf. He wasn't sure if he was supposed to be focused on the pitch of the chirps, or something else. It's frankly absurd that you would assume that Joe is tone-deaf based entirely on that clip alone. Commenting on his lack of knowledge of music terminology is also a bit of a strange, unnecessary addition. You may as well say that someone who doesn't know how to distinguish between colors with the proper terminology must be colorblind. It seems you missed the part in the clip at 16:05 where Joe clearly states that the puzzle he was struggling with was at the entrance of an area. Your later claim that the puzzle was "clearly not introductory" is completely off base since the puzzle in fact isn't obviously not meant to be introductory when said puzzle is literally placed by the entrance to a new area. One would logically assume the puzzle by the entrance to an area would be used to introduce the concepts that are meant to be explored in the rest of the area. That is what Joe was implying here. Your little jab at 33:00 is completely unnecessary. He obviously isn't saying that The Witness needs to be an action platformer. He's just criticizing the fact that he can't maneuver around the landscape as well as one would naturally assume given that the game is set in an open-world environment. You quite literally use the open-world nature of the game to counter his points about getting stuck on puzzles, so when he makes a critique about how the game isn't as open as he expected, you immediately jump to making a snide remark that doesn't actually effectively counter his statement. I'm just gonna repeat what DanielVan12 said about 39:40. The preceding topic before the "Assuming I'm wrong..." bit was a brief introduction of who Jonathan Blow is and a comment on him being a recognizable name in the gaming landscape. So, when Joe says, "Assuming I'm wrong..." the full context would be something like, "Assuming I'm wrong and you aren't familiar with the discourse around Jonathan Blow..." You've either skipped directly to that part of the video with no context because you're solely reliant on the comment section to know where each segment begins and ends, or you're actively choosing to cut context to make Joe look worse. I genuinely don't get what you're trying to get at with your argument at 45:37. Joe was clearly frustrated that he had to wait 56 minutes just to be able to complete a single puzzle. Sure, it's technically optional, but his argument still stands for anyone who would attempt to 100% complete the game. Having to watch through a 56-minute long video for a single puzzle is absurd, and the fact that your argument is just explaining how the puzzle works and saying, "If you think it's a waste of time, you've chosen to waste your own time" is not an adequate rebuttal. There will be people who want to 100% complete a game. Telling those people that they're ruining the experience for themselves when the game is actively sabotaging their efforts with time-wasting bullcrap is ridiculous, straight up. Once again, at 49:11, this is completely unnecessary and mean-spirited. Like, why does it matter that he's a writer and that he links to his work in the description? What point are you trying to make by pointing out his grammatical errors other than, "Teehee, dude is an author who doesn't know how to write basic English, lmao." Authors aren't infallible. Authors (and by extension anyone with any experience with any art form) are going to make mistakes. I would assume Joe, like most writers, hired an editor to look over his book and help correct mistakes before publishing. It is a very common practice, and your claim that it's inexcusable for a writer to make mistakes is a demonstration of your own ignorance about what it's like to be an author. Your point is just an attempt to insult Joe and make him look dumb. He's not assuming people classify stories the same way he does at 51:22? He's giving a way to classify stories to attempt to explain why he has issues with the story of The Witness without overwhelming the viewer with complex authorial terms. Also, while his categories may be subjective in nature, it's relatively easy to understand what he's getting at. The interpretation of stories is also inherently subjective, so it isn't a problem for someone to establish subjective terms to simplify the concept being addressed. You may as well say it's ridiculous to claim a distinction between genres because the genre of a work of fiction is inherently subjective. Your criticism of his creation of the simple vs complex model is an extremely nitpicky jab at the video. So... Why is it okay for you to bring up the subjective terms made up by Hello Future Me at 52:00 as a valid way of interpreting The Witness, but the terms created by Joe in the video aren't valid? Like, saying a story has Soft Worldbuilding is as subjective as saying a story is simple in nature, but complex in the way it's told. As mentioned in my example with genres above, categorizing stories is inherently subjective. There are no hard and fast rules that stories abide by, so how can one claim that there is a way to engage with or describe media that is more objective and valid than another? ... 55:04... God damn it, not this again... Stop trying to insult his status as an author, please. You are not helping your point. You're just being a jerk. So, I'm sure someone else pointed this out at 57:00, but the reason he doesn't go into depth about the more complex videos is that they aren't the point of Joe's video. Joe is trying to give a critique of The Witness as a game. He isn't going to bog down his video by breaking down the more nuanced videos, because they aren't going to add much to his own point. We don't know for sure if he actually thought they were engaging or not. He's able to give sufficient summaries for the other videos specifically because they are easier to understand and summarize. He's just trying to give quick a breakdown of what each video is about without wasting too much time, and unfortunately, the more complex videos just weren't easily described. 1:01:38... "Philosophy is an inherently subjective field"... Then why are you angry that Joe is being subjective?... About a game that's all about philosophy and subjective interpretation? Are you being for real? Genuinely, what is the point of this video if everything related to The Witness is rooted in subjectivity? You're assumed "contradiction" at 1:07:10 is inaccurate. The text on the screen may say, "The players will understand", but what you and Joe actually say is, "Players are meant to understand." These are two entirely different statements. Joe's assumption that players will be frustrated by the placement of the entrance to the final level does not contradict the claim that players are meant to understand that they aren't supposed to access that part of the game. Players can understand the creator's intent, and be frustrated by it. The reason Joe says it's a mean trick at 01:07:35 is because it's meant to conceal the solutions to puzzles within the final level area when the puzzles themselves can be found outside that area. The red herring adds insult to injury by pretending that the solution is visible from where the player can access the puzzle when the actual solution is locked away in the final area of the game. Your explanation that it is similar to the other desert puzzles doesn't counter Joe's statement about it feeling mean in execution.

I've only seen this today and as someone who's been extremely frustrated with that video (and more generally Joseph Anderson), which YT tries to get me to watch every 6 months, it was very refreshing (even if maybe a little mean in parts, at least for YT :D). There's one thing about this, and others of his videos, that I really don't like: he basically refuses to meet games on their own terms. This is imo the source of a lot of the issues you brought up. And it's weird seeing people in the comments say "but it's just subjective opinions" when his video has basically become the canon, and people parrot everything he said, even using terms they'd never use otherwise. I followed Blow since Braid and he often talked about respecting player's time, no one else ever talked about it. Anderson made this video, and people still don't use that phrase *except* when talking about the witness. And that's not going into the whole pretentious thing, which usually I found people can't really back up, because they're using pretentious to at best say "self-indulgent" (which I guess is true, while pretentious isn't at all, since the whole point of the game is to communicate things) And regarding that part on Braid, even though I think it's extremely fair to argue against its "importance" (for reasons like privileges, or blow himself), it's weird to say "I did play it but it wasn't a big deal at the time". I wonder how much time and money he invested in indies before that. (though yeah as someone else said the part about "assuming I'm wrong" is probably just weird structure responding to the previous statement he made)

i wish people weren’t so disproportionately mean about this video but i guess that’s what happens when two prominent (and fallible) video essayists have conflicting opinions with you. honestly the fact that most people’s primary rebuttal is “you really shouldn’t be insulting anderson so harshly” kind of cements the fact that this is really just a product of #1 joseph anderson fanboys feeling personally attacked #2 the established bias that if a woman vocally dislikes another person, or otherwise takes up an undesired amount of space, that devalues anything they stand for have to say. this video kicks ass and i personally would say it’s within your right to disregard, like, 90% of the negative feedback on this (if it even still occupies your mind after 2 years).

Really appreciated being able to jump to this video right after Andersons. I thought so much of it was misunderstood and thought I was going crazy. Couldn’t agree with your points more, comments are rough though. Hope it makes you a better creator and you keep making content!

Hall Michael Perez Brian Lewis Nancy

You suck.

watching this after an edible was definitely a trip down memory lane

If you’re gonna make a video tearing into someone, making baseless accusations and “borrowing” insults drafted by far better writers, you really should have a better understanding of someone than “just one video.” If you were just refuting his opinion on the witness, that’s fine. It’s something everyone, Joe included, encourages. But this video, despite being about one review this guy made, reaches far beyond into insulting him, his intelligence, his writing and media analysis skills, all the while making basic reading comprehension mistakes like at 39:40 that are so grievously incorrect that it is far more damning for your credibility, because it means you are either A) willing to warp and manipulate a work in such a way that it matches the conclusions you came to before engaging with the work, which is the antithesis to how we are supposed to conduct any form of media analysis. Or B) you made a genuine mistake, which is fine, it’s something all of us do, but it’s a mistake that allows you to further tear into Joe, which you based the next segment of your video on, and this, to use your own words, “baby’s first high-school thesis,” is both incorrect and bad faith. To use my own words, this is a bad video. I don’t need to incorrectly parrot Dan Olsen to reach that conclusion.

Also, equating video games to how much value you get per hour is a very very slippery slope. Games are more than that and the Witness legitimately does not justify a $40 price tag.

Subjectivity is implied.

Wow... What a terrible video. Yours, not Andersons.

I very much didn't like the video, but since it was all optional content I guess I won't say anything about it.

This is a modern-day Jonathan Blow crying in a dark room at Soulja Boy misunderstanding Braid.

Just because you have a good argument doesn’t mean you need to make a dick out of yourslef

This is the worst video on RUclips, for so many reasons. The very personal attacks on Joseph and his literary career ("I'm not even going to comment on his book" immediately touches on the topic just to be spiteful while providing no criticism of substance), being extremely hypocritical (refusing to engage with his content, his criticisms and his ideas, as you've made up your mind that Joe is an idiot and deserves no benefit of doubt), doubling down on your mistakes in the comments and straight up contradicting yourself throughout the video, like when you said: "The Witness teaches you to be observant of ALL of your surroundings" (which is SUCH a nothing burger of a statement. How are you supposed to know what you're looking for, especially when you give stupid hints like pay attention to everything). And later in the video, in an effort to insult Joseph (as that always takes precedence in this video, it seems), you say stuff like "you're not supposed to be looking out for these puzzles, you're supposed to explore, enjoy the moment and find these puzzles just on happenstance alone". THERE is so much wrong with this sentence, even when ignoring the obvious contradiction to earlier points you've made. You're imposing your own conclusions on somebody's experience with the game. You're ignoring the fact that you most likely will NEVER finish the game if you don't actively go looking for these puzzles, which means you'll miss out on the witness experience. This ain't it, chief. This video isn't a debate, it isn't a rebuttal and it isn't a defense of the game. This video is an ad hominem, and it definitely left a stain on your channel. When you hit it big and become a big video essayist, this is the one video you should disown.

I saw Anderson's video before this refutation and I felt horrible after that. I thought again and again that "What is wrong with you, dude, why are you so butthurt by a puzzle game? Never ever thought someone can make such a rant about a zen-like experience"...and there we go, like, what did you expect from this virtual walking and thinking simulator: an endless dopamine source for everyone? 😬 I'm so sorry, I really don't want to be toxic, but yeah, if you can't get the main concept you should not rant about it (even if you cover yourself with the good old and boring "it is my subjective opinion" excuse), because you might get a "subjective" counter-rant, surprise! But what made me real sad and puzzled (haha) is what I have just read here in the comments. At what point of our history forgot the people enjoying challenges and to play just for the sake of playing and thinking? This game is not even essentially about solving the puzzles but the real struggle to be temporarily stuck and think again...and again....and again, like in real life. I might be the biggest bully or an autistic idealist, but enough of me, I'll rather watch how the Cracking the cryptic guy enjoys being unaware and stupid at first, and how he adapts to the inbuilt rules, because that is what makes us great imho. <3

Why does your face look like that?

Drinking game: everytime you hear "um"

this video is incredibly mean spirited and has such a holier-than-thou attitude considering how many straight up mistakes and/or misinterpretations of what JA said are included :P

@Allirontalks Real question: now that it’s been a few years, do you understand why people don’t vibe with this video? Have you actually read the comments and done any self-reflection? This isn’t a bit. I’m genuinely curious. This could have been a good video premise, but instead it is so far up its own ass with its clear bad faith “criticism” and needless personal attacks that any value it would have had is lost. It’s just petty. It’s a shame, too, because I came into this video genuinely wanting to vibe with it. Joe’s video is in no shape or form perfect, but it added more to the conversation than yours did. Not because you’re inherently wrong in your opinions, but your execution is fatally flawed in my opinion, and clearly the opinion of most of these comments. The ad hominem attacks just completely overshadow any valid points you do happen to bring up. Clearly, he didn’t enjoy the game in the way you did, and that’s okay! It just feels weird that you seem to take this all so personally. Maybe I’m wrong, but that’s how it comes across. Read the other comments. I have. A lot of them have some good advice on how this video could have been made with less, I don’t know, toxic, for lack of a better term, aspects. As it stands, this video just feels petty, condescending, and even mean-spirited. I would like to see an updated version of this video that is better researched, better thought out, less petty, and in good faith. There’s a nugget of a good idea here, but this just completely misses the mark as it stands. Learn from this and do better. I believe you’re capable of it. Would love to hear your thoughts. Apologies if any of this comes off as condescending or rude, that isn’t my intention. Genuinely just trying to start a productive dialogue. Anyway, just my two cents.

Ugh, Joseph's video had me cringing with almost every line. He obviously doesn't enjoy puzzle games, and so he misunderstood a lot about a game that clearly wasn't made for people like him. I'm glad to see someone who enjoys and understands puzzle games do an hour-long critique. Instant sub!

i always got caught off-guard by how the caption transcribes "himaruya" into "hemorrhoids" 💀

I think the entire problem with reviews and critiques of games is the same as reviews and critiques of art, they mean different things to different people. Personally, I'm a huge believer in the idea of the Death of the Author. Whatever Blow meant to say with this game will meaningfully be lost in some capacity to anyone but himself. I disagreed with a lot of Anderson's critiques of the game as well, but that's because we didn't play the same game. Where he saw backtracking and tedious design, I saw a message to slow down and appreciate the world. Neither one of these perspectives is necessarily right or wrong, but each is a valid interpretation of intentional design choices. Art, in my opinion, is meant to highlight the both the differences and similarities we have with other people. While Anderson and I interpret the game and its design choices in starkly different ways, we both still believe it to be a great game. Ultimately, that is what I think the game was meant to be, and based in the responses, it seems that it did just that.

this is the problem with troons

I really like the cat sounds in your chapter headers :)

This was really hard to listen to. Criticism coming from a position of superiority and ignorance is rarely correct.

You're a bully..

your math said 523 panels where 25 panels are straight or right angles. that makes 498 puzzles without the EP. which means they counted; as EPs are counted separately... not even your math is correct.

I am sorry, but 27:00 was the point where the hate towards Anderson hits the point of being way too obvious to not be called out. You are essentially saying "That statement was as indicative of a lack of intelligence as if you had just said 'I think the Earth is flat.'" Did you write this whole script in linear order, put in the bit about not calling him an idiot or a moron as an aspirational statement, and then forget to actually follow through on it?

Damn this shit is ass

This is a shocking bad video. Petty insults? Wow.

_The Witness_ is a masterpiece. You were right to dislike Joseph Anderson's negative review. Did you criticise it in an entirely fair manner? Did he criticise Jonathan Blow in an entirely fair manner? I don't care.