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HOW TO USE THIS GUIDE
Just like there's more than one way to solve some puzzles in The Witness, there's more than one way to use this guide.
We begin with a series of hints designed to gently nudge you toward solutions. If you're looking for a complete walkthrough with solutions, those appear next, at a safe distance for those who wish to avoid spoilers. Because they often require you to solve the area's puzzles first, we end with a guide to finding collectibles. Whatever your choice, you can jump directly to each section using the table of contents below.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Hints
There is a traceable prerequisite to beginning this series of puzzles.
The key to solving puzzles lies in the area's name.
Symmetry Island introduces a new puzzle-solving concept that extends beyond the surface level. If you get stuck, look beyond the surface level solutions.
Knowing that you need to look beyond the puzzles is not only crucial, but it's employed diabolically, a strategy that The Witness excels at. Even though it's taught you a way to solve a puzzle, don't assume that there's only one way that can manifest. In fact, thinking that the way it worked for previous puzzles is the exact same way it works right now is folly.
Be sure to check out our beginner's guide for more general tips for the discerning island survivalist.
SPOILERS AND SOLUTIONS BELOW
Walkthrough and solutions
The first puzzle teases what's to come with a door.
PUZZLE SERIES 1
PUZZLE SERIES 2
Note that the third puzzle in this sequence has more than one solution.
PUZZLE SERIES 3
PUZZLE SERIES 4
This series is all about tracing. And it's also where you learn a very valuable lesson that will apply over and over: You do not need to stand right in front of a puzzle to solve it. Move those feet.
PUZZLE SERIES 5
COLLECTIBLES
This is a puzzle of a different sort, and it requires the correct vantage point. Walk just beyond the door you unlocked to enter this area, turn left and stare over the cliff toward the Glass Factory. Stand in the right place, and you can make the round base and the line that runs up through the roof intersect. Invoke puzzle-solving mode and trace your way through the path you've created.
When you've completed the puzzle, you'll see sparkles of glowing energy eject from what you traced. Watch it go, and follow it out the door and to your left toward the Desert Temple.
You'll find an obelisk. On the obelisk, you'll find a small, glowing yellow version of the rune you just traced.
