Don't you dare use Discord to communicate in co-op puzzle game Big Walk

I played first-person co-op puzzle game Big Walk with strangers back in March and had an absolute gas. Naturally, it’s even better with friends: in two long sessions with my PC Gamer pals Tyler and Morgan, we’ve solved over a dozen puzzles, had twice as many laughs, and as you might expect, done a heck of a lot of walking.

This isn’t a review: after about 6 hours we’ve conquered a whole mess of puzzles but there’s still most of the island left to tackle, and I can’t wait to get back in there for more.

After a tutorial consisting of just a few signs on the wall telling us how to use our arms and legs, we set off onto a sprawling island covered in trees, rivers, rocks, and brightly colored puzzle-structures scattered around the landscape. Each puzzle awards a prize I internally call a nubbin (because it doesn’t, as far as I know, have a name) and those nubbins have a use I won’t specify, but the more of them you collect the deeper into the island you’ll begin to explore.

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The puzzles, honestly, aren’t terrifically hard to figure out so far: the real challenge comes from communication and logistics because no puzzle can be solved alone. At minimum, you need two players, and the puzzles scale up to four: for example, if a puzzle in a two-player session needs both players to hold down buttons at the same time, a four-player session will feature four buttons.

Stray more than a few yards from a pal and you’ll have to strain to hear their voice over proximity chat. Another few steps and you won’t be able to hear them at all. You can communicate visually by pointing and waving your noodly arms, and there are items you can find and put to use: walkie-talkies, laser pointers, flashlights, even signs you can type messages on.

(Image credit: Panic)

But those objects all have to be carried in your hands, and you can only carry one thing at a time—at least until you start finding useful accessories like backpacks and holsters. If you take a tumble you’ll drop your item, which may bounce away into the woods or down the side of a mountain. Even if you don’t drop your item, you’ll have to ditch it if you find something else you want to carry.

That’s been the real challenge so far: not so much the puzzle solutions but navigating, communicating, and juggling the items we need to bring with us or leave behind. Even when everyone agrees on a course of action, that plan can fall apart by someone tumbling down a hill, getting lost, slipping out of earshot, or to use one specific example, the time Tyler accidentally kicked the binoculars we just found off the top of a tall tower and into the woods below.

Thing is, Big Walk is so chill that little disasters like that are just kinda funny. It’s a beautiful, peaceful world, there are no scares or monsters, and no death or fail state. The worst that can happen is someone falls off a ledge or drops an item or gets lost. No problem. We’ll take a detour. We’ll make do without a walkie-talkie. We’ll eventually find each other. There’s no need to stress.

(Image credit: Panic)

My favorite intersection of Big Walk’s systems was when we were working on a puzzle (don’t worry, I won’t spoil the solution) where we were separated by soundproof glass. We didn’t have walkie-talkies with us, so I communicated non-verbally to signal Tyler and Morgan to perform certain actions on the other side of the glass. First, I tried pointing at things, but that wasn’t clear enough, so we tried a system where I raised and lowered my arms in a sequence. That worked a lot better and we got halfway through the puzzle.

But there’s a day-night cycle in Big Walk, and as the sun set, the world grew dark—like not “videogame dark,” but realistically dark. Since the wall behind me was green, and I had coincidentally chosen to paint my body green earlier in the game, I started blending into the wall behind me in the dim light. That meant Morgan and Tyler could no longer clearly see my arm motions—and they couldn’t tell me they couldn’t see my arm motions because I was behind soundproof glass.

It’s like stepping into a more relaxed version of Myst or The Witness, and you’ve got your friends there to help.

When I saw them doing the wrong action, I ran to the glass and pounded my little fists on it, hoping to alert them: but their backs were turned and they couldn’t hear the “tink tink tink” of my hands beating on glass because, again, soundproofing.

We had to start the puzzle over again, but it was such a silly situation none of us minded, and on our final try we also found a solution to the darkness problem. Third time’s the charm.

(Image credit: Panic)

Progress in Big Walk is tantalizing: reaching a new area means gaining a new view of the island, getting glimpses of more puzzles and structures and features in the distance, giving your efforts a new direction. It’s like stepping into a more relaxed version of Myst or The Witness: there are lots of mysteries on the island to unravel but no frustration to go along with them—and you’ve got your friends there to help.

Before you visit the island for yourself, I’m issuing a final warning: Don’t play this Big Walk while chatting with your pals over Discord. Only use in-game proximity chat. The game will warn you as such on first launch, and while many prox chat games are still just as fun over Discord, this one isn’t.

Being able to hear your friends no matter where they are will make things far too easy and will rob you of some of the creative solutions and little disasters that makes the world so satisfying to explore. To accommodate, Big Walk comes with high quality voice chat that includes noise cancelling and a dedicated mute button.

Plus, the faster you solve the puzzles, the quicker you’ll finish Big Walk—and this is one game where you definitely don’t want to rush to the end. It’s out August 4.

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