Can Big Walk fly? How do I get higher?

There is no flight ability and no gliding. What does exist is a prop climbing technique that gains height repeatedly: let go of the item, jump onto it, pick it back up, and loop those three steps. The key is rhythm rather than speed - too fast and the item never leaves your hands, too slow and it is out of pickup range. On PC you can bind jump to the mouse wheel to take the timing pressure off.

How does the key chain work in Big Walk?

You do not need a guide to find the five cutting stations. Finishing a tower gives you an unfinished blank key; once it goes through the first cutter, an arrow appears on its head pointing at the next cutter's location. Follow the arrows through all five and the shape finally matches - and it opens exactly the transport that belongs to that tower.

Which of Big Walk's four transports is fastest?

By the conclusion of players who timed it: the tunnels from the yellow tower are the fastest way between areas, then the shortcut through the middle of the mountain. The chairlift from the green tower is the quickest single line up the mountain. The blue tower's monorail is explicitly rated pretty much useless, being slow with too few departures. That is the real reason the community recommends red, then green, then yellow, then blue - transport, not story.

General techniques: how to get up, how to get across, how to find the next step

A puzzle guide tells you how to solve one puzzle, but a certain class of trouble keeps recurring: not high enough, cannot move the thing, do not know where to go next. None of those belong to a single puzzle, which is why no single puzzle page can hold them. This page does.

Every entry below names the player report it came from. One of them we have to flag before you read it -it is a question this site used to answer wrongly.

Corrected:Prop climbing / prop climb

This site previously answered the question as "you cannot fly, those guides are just positioning tricks". That was wrong. Trick climbing is a different thing; this loop is a documented method for gaining height. Corrected.

Prop climbing / prop climb

What you get - The only known way to gain height on a loop. Used to reach high anchors and get over walls you cannot normally clear.

1
One thing to clear up first
The game has no flight and no gliding - official and community agree on that. But the community does have a repeatable climb that looks like flying from outside, and guides are literally titled How to fly. So the honest answer to "can you fly" is: you cannot fly, you can climb.
2
The three-step loop
It is three actions, repeated: 1. let go of the item → 2. jump onto it → 3. pick it back up. Every step happens in an instant, and the height comes from landing on the item while it is still in the air.
3
Use rhythm, not speed
The author's own words are "do it to a rhythm". Both too fast and too slow fail, just in different ways (see the symptom table below). A light ball or the map both work - one guide puts it plainly as "the best item is the map".
4
The PC shortcut
If you have no rhythm (the author says they do not either), bind jump to the mouse wheel and let the wheel's continuous input stand in for manual timing. Some players go further and macro the whole loop.

If it fails, how to tell why

Three symptoms point at two causes, so do not go and practise your feel for it - work out which one you have first.

Symptom	Actual cause
The item does not drop, it just jitters in your hands	The gap between dropping and picking up is too short. Wait a beat longer before you grab.
The item flies off and you cannot get it back	You are too slow - it has already left pickup range. The grab input needs to be faster.
No height at all	Two possibilities: the jump timing is wrong (too early and the item has not left your hands, too late and it is out of reach), or the item is not airborne long enough because you re-grab it too fast. Both point to "loosen the rhythm a little", and mashing jump is a legitimate fix.

Evidence - The Steam Community guides How to fly and prop climb document the three-step loop, the rhythm requirement, all three failure symptoms with their causes, and the PC wheel-bind and macro workarounds. Two separate guides named "How to fly" and "How to fly / prop climbing" describe the same mechanic.

Source:How to fly / prop climb(Guliker)

Grab chaining

What you get - Reach heights you cannot climb to and get over fences and walls. Places that look like they need three or more people often need two, if they chain.

1
The basic move: the boost
One person stands still, the other jumps on top of them (or the standing player lifts them). It is the first two-player move in the game - the robotic arm switch on the opening bridge exists to teach it.
2
Next level: the chain
Once the first person has a secure grip, a second person grabs them, and so on upward, one link at a time. That is how you get over walls and railings to heights a single boost cannot reach.
3
Learn to run it in reverse too
The yellow cube structures that hold megaphones work both ways: your team boosts you up, and once you are on top you pull them up after you. So do not climb up and walk off - there are still people below.

Evidence - The 100% achievement guide lists "take turns boosting up a chain of grabs to clear walls" as a general technique, and the megaphone location guide notes that all three yellow cube structures need the boost-up-then-pull-up-them sequence.

Source:Big Walk - 100% Achievement Guide(tasselfoot)

The key chain

What you get - Stop hunting guides for the five cutting stations - the game tells you where the next one is.

1
Every tower gives you a blank key
Finish a coloured tower and you get an unfinished key. It does not work yet; the shape is wrong.
2
The first cutter works it and shows an arrow
Put the blank key into the first cutter. It gets one pass of work, and an arrow appears on the head of the key pointing at the next cutter's location. Follow the arrows through all five and the shape finally matches.
3
Five cuts, and the matching transport opens
A key that has been through all five opens the transport belonging to that tower: red tower to the map room, green to the chairlift, yellow to the tunnels, blue to the monorail.

Evidence - The Island map guide states it directly: the first cutter works the key and reveals an arrow to the next one, and completing all five in order unlocks the matching transport.

Source:The Island map: gourds, keys, gear and challenges(RuneSurveyor)

Choosing a transport

What you get - Saves a large amount of time otherwise spent walking back the way you came.

1
The four tower rewards
Red tower gives the map (no more getting lost, and it unlocks the coordinate puzzles), green gives the chairlift (quickest way up the mountain), yellow gives the tunnels (flat routes straight through the rock), blue gives the monorail (one direction, few departures).
2
What field reports actually conclude
Players who timed it give a blunt ranking: the tunnels are the fastest way between areas, then the shortcut through the middle of the mountain. The monorail is called out as pretty much useless - slow, and there are too few cars.
3
So the tower order is not arbitrary
Take the red tower first for the map and compass, then the green for the chairlift. After those two, every later job that involves crossing the island for parts gets easier. That is the real reason behind the community order red, green, yellow, blue - not story, transport.

Evidence - 100% achievement guide: "we found the tunnels to be the fastest way between areas, or the shortcut through the middle of the mountain next to the golf ball. The monorail is basically useless, too slow and too few cars." The Island map guide gives the same four tower-to-transport pairings.

Source:Big Walk - 100% Achievement Guide(tasselfoot)

Start the timed objectives first

What you get - Pure planning time - there is a class of challenge whose entire content is waiting.

1
Some challenges only count time
One of the purple endgame challenges locks you in a room for 30 minutes and completes when the clock runs out, and the main game has a 5-minute version. Neither tests execution, only time.
2
So switching it on is the first job
When you enter an area with a timed challenge, start it first and then go do everything else. The 30 minutes are exactly the window you need for the rest.
3
Does someone have to stay inside?
The field reports say you lock yourself in, the timer starts, and nobody has to watch it. Whether somebody must remain present differs slightly between groups, so the safe play is to leave one person inside while everyone else works.

Evidence - The purple challenge field report documents the 30-minute room and the 5-minute room, how they work, and why you plan around them.

Source:Big Walk - Challenge [Purple] Puzzles Advice / Tips(tasselfoot)

Four towers, four kinds of transport

Put the tower rewards side by side and the tower order stops being folklore: red, green, yellow, blue is recommended because once you hold the map and the chairlift, every later trip across the island to find parts gets shorter.

Tower	What it gives	What it is actually good for
Red Tower	Map room + folding map + compass	Unlocks the coordinate puzzles. No more getting lost.
Green Tower	Chairlift	The fastest single line up the mountain.
Yellow Tower	Tunnels	Flat routes through the rock - measured as the fastest way between areas.
Blue Tower	Monorail	One direction, few departures; rated "pretty much useless" in the field.

"Pretty much useless" is the field report's own verdict on the monorail, not our wording. We kept it, because it is a measured judgement from playing, and softening it into neutral language would throw information away.

Corrections to what this site said before