The best game of the year contenders are the ones you don’t see coming. That describes Big Walk, the latest game from Untitled Goose Game developer House House. There has been plenty of buzz behind the co-op puzzle game since it was first announced, but even its biggest admirers probably didn’t expect it to become the best reviewed game of 2026. With 13 scored reviews in, plus a handful of unscored praise, Big Walk sits at a 93 on Metacritic. That makes it the best reviewed new release of 2026, beating Forza Horizon 6 and Mina the Hollower.
So what’s the big deal? Critics across the board are charmed by the multiplayer game’s brilliant puzzle design and chill-out vibes. In a 9/10 review for Gamespot, Mark Delaney calls it “one of the best co-op games ever.” He praises House House’s hands-off approach to design, allowing players to discover all the secrets scattered across Big Walk‘s open-world island.
“Big Walk’s world speaks for itself,” Delaney writes. “Across its realistic-looking landscape are many more cartoonishly colored structures of all shapes and sizes that stick out by contrast, and developer House House trusts each friend group to carve out their own adventure through the world, letting their curiosity guide them and building on shared learning hour after hour.”
The puzzle design is a high-point across the board for critics. In a five-star review for Restart, Imran Khan praised a strong collection of puzzles that push you and your friends to talk out solutions: “There’s a lot of puzzles in Big Walk and as our group did more and more, we got better and better at learning to communicate within the game’s absurd contexts, at interpreting how each other think, at knowing exactly what it means when someone sits down and raises their arms above their heads.”
There’s also plenty of praise for Big Walk‘s ending across the board, though, you’ll have to play for yourself to see what the fuss is about there. Chris Schilling gave a tease of what to expect in a five-star review for Eurogamer.
“I’m reluctant to even hint at it, so I’ll just say that it feels like a subtle but ingenious twist on a familiar game design maxim,” Schilling wrote. “If the best video game challenges test everything you’ve learned, this is more about what you’ve come to understand about the people you’ve shared this journey with, and the weird and wonderful ways you’ve invented to overcome the difficulties you’ve faced together.”
For what it’s worth, the praise lines up with my own thoughts on Big Walk. Polygon’s own review, which I co-wrote alongside my colleauges Julia Lee and Johnny Yu, stresses that Big Walk is an unforgettable hang-out game that pushes you to form closer bonds with your friends. Its emphasis on communication makes it feel like a summer camp where you walk away even closer to your friends. If you can get some pals together for it (Big Walk supports anywhere from two to 12 players, with puzzles that scale to your group), take the walk for yourself and discover what makes Big Walk one of 2026’s best games.