Metacritic

Big Walk's specific Metacritic aggregate score is to be confirmed — the game launched on August 4, 2026, the major reviews have now published, and the aggregate critic average on Metacritic has not been confirmed in our sources as of this writing. What is already clear is that individual critic reviews are strongly positive, with multiple outlets calling it one of the best games of 2026. Here is what we know about Big Walk's critical reception and where to find the Metacritic score once it is official.

The Metacritic Score Is To Be Confirmed

The exact Big Walk Metacritic score — the aggregated critic average out of 100 — is to be confirmed. Metacritic compiles its own review pool and publishes the aggregate on its own schedule, so even with the game out and the major reviews live, the confirmed number is what Metacritic itself displays, not a figure circulated elsewhere. Treat any specific number that does not come from Metacritic or OpenCritic directly as unverified.

Once the page is populated, searching "Big Walk" on metacritic.com will display the official aggregate critic score for the game. Until then, the reliable signal is not a number but a tone: the individual reviews that have published since launch are enthusiastically positive.

Individual Reviews Are Strongly Positive

While the aggregate Metacritic figure is pending, the individual critic reviews that have published are strongly positive:

• IGN praised Big Walk as a clever co-op puzzle adventure that uses communication like no other game, based on nearly 20 hours of play.
• Kotaku called it one of the best games of 2026, highlighting the joy of its emergent, goofy co-op moments — laughter, off-key walkie-talkie singing, and friends chucking each other off towers.
• GameSpot also placed it among the best games of 2026, framing it as an open-world co-op puzzle-adventure with few rules and no quest markers.
• Polygon focused on its unexpectedly emotional ending, describing the finale as a capstone that elevates a carefree multiplayer adventure into something genuinely affecting.

This pattern — multiple major outlets independently calling a game one of the year's best, with no review flagging serious problems beyond finicky movement on rocky terrain — typically translates into a strong Metacritic aggregate once the full review pool is counted. But that is reasoning, not a confirmed score. The confirmed number will only be known when Metacritic publishes it.

The Substance Behind The Scores

The reviews are not thin numbers — they are deep, played-to-completion write-ups, which makes their agreement more meaningful. IGN's reviewer spent nearly 20 hours with a core group of three and still had puzzles remaining; Kotaku's reviewer logged about 20 hours, beat the campaign, and immediately scheduled a return session for the post-game content; GameSpot's writer published a tips guide after finishing the game.

What they praise is remarkably consistent from outlet to outlet:

• Proximity voice chat as the core mechanic — voices fade with distance, muffle through walls, echo in tunnels, and crackle over walkie-talkies, turning audio itself into a puzzle.
• Emergent, unscripted comedy — reviewers at separate outlets describe laughing as hard as they have all year at moments the game merely facilitated between friends.
• An unexpectedly emotional ending — a finale that strips away communication tools and tests what the group has built, called one of the best parts of the game.
• A hand-crafted, finite campaign — designed to be played start-to-finish with one group of friends, not ground through solo.

Against that, the single recurring negative is narrow: characters snag or wedge on uphill and rocky terrain. When the criticism across four major outlets is this contained, the shape of the reception is clear even before the aggregate lands.

Critic Score Versus Player Score

Once the aggregate appears, keep the two kinds of score separate. The Metacritic number is the critic average — professional reviews written after full playthroughs. Player scores, on Steam reviews and Metacritic's user section, will tell a different and noisier story, because Big Walk's enjoyment depends heavily on conditions the critic controlled and a random buyer might not.

A player who bought it without a friend group, or who routed voice through Discord against every reviewer's advice, may bounce off a game that critics adored — and their review will say so. That is not a contradiction; it is the nature of a co-op-only game. Read player reviews for warnings about scheduling and the host-tied save, and read the critic aggregate for the quality of the crafted experience itself.

Why The Score Matters Less Than Usual Here

For most games, the Metacritic score is the headline number. For Big Walk, it matters less, because the experience is inseparable from your specific group of friends. Big Walk is co-op only — there is no way to play it alone — and its magic lives in the shared, communicative chaos of your crew inventing its own language for an unnamed island.

A strong aggregate score will not save a session with a group that cannot commit, and a merely good score will not diminish a great session with the right one. Reviewers at two separate outlets spent roughly 20 hours with the game, and both framed the highlight not as any single puzzle but as what happened between the people playing.

So while the score is a useful data point, the better question is whether you can convene a committed group of friends for a start-to-finish campaign. Scheduling is the real gate: the save lives on the host's side, reviewers suggest roughly one night a week for a month to see it through, and a group that cannot hold together that long will not finish regardless of what any aggregator says.

Where To Check The Confirmed Score

To find the official aggregate once it is available:

• Metacritic — the official aggregated critic score (the number you are looking for). Search "Big Walk" on metacritic.com.
• OpenCritic — a popular alternative aggregator that some players prefer, also compiling the critic average from published reviews.
• Steam reviews — player reviews from people who bought the game, separate from the critic score and useful as a second opinion.

For the critic average specifically, Metacritic remains the standard reference, with OpenCritic as the main cross-check. If the number matters to your purchase decision, check both once the review pool has filled out — the two aggregators count overlapping but not identical sets of reviews, so a small difference between them is normal and neither is wrong.

One practical tip: the aggregate is a snapshot that can shift in the weeks after launch as additional outlets publish. A score you see on day one may not be the score the game settles at, so if you are citing the number anywhere, note when you checked it.

What To Expect Based On The Coverage

Given that IGN, Kotaku, GameSpot, and Polygon have all published strongly positive coverage — with multiple "best of 2026" declarations already on record — the reasonable expectation is a high Metacritic aggregate. The lone recurring criticism in the reviews is finicky movement on uphill and rocky terrain, the kind of minor friction that rarely moves an aggregate on its own.

But expectations are not confirmed scores. Wait for the official Metacritic page to publish the real number before treating any figure as fact, and be skeptical of screenshots or claims that cannot be traced back to the aggregator itself.

Summary

Big Walk's Metacritic score is to be confirmed following its August 4, 2026 launch. Individual critic reviews from IGN, Kotaku, GameSpot, and Polygon are strongly positive, with several calling it one of the best games of 2026 — a pattern that typically points to a high aggregate. Check Metacritic and OpenCritic for the official number, and remember that for a co-op-only game, your friend group matters more than the score.

RELATED BIG WALK TOPICS

These related pages complete the picture:

OTHER BIG WALK REVIEW TOPICS