It's no secret that I like my videogames to come in boxes. I was thus very happy to learn that a boxed edition of The Witness, the long-awaited follow-up to Jonathan Blow's hit puzzle-platformer Braid, is "likely" going to happen.
"We have been in talks with a couple of parties for a while about that possibility. *However*, it looks like if there is a retail release, it won’t happen until a little bit after the digital release," Blow wrote. "The reason is just that we need all the time we can get up until the release date in order to get all the finishing touches into the game; but because of the lead-time involved in physical manufacturing and distribution, we would have to freeze the game right about now in order to have it on store shelves for the release date."
Of course, the studio could delay the digital release of the game to accommodate the box, but Blow said there's no good reason for doing that either. "I would rather just focus our energy on making the game as good as we can make it, and a retail version can lag behind by a little bit," he added.
The majority of The Witness' voice work and translations are done, and Blow said that the graphics are "mostly locked down" as well: "We are no longer changing big things about how the game looks, we're more making spot-fixes here and there every time we see something we don't totally like."
The Witness system requirements were revealed yesterday, and they are pleasingly light. The game is slated for release in January.
