// PC GAMER — GAMING
Communication is the biggest puzzle piece in chill co-op game Big Walk, so don't take any shortcuts by using Discord
Stick to proximity chat: robbing the game of its creative problem solving takes away a lot of the fun.
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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.
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.
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.
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