How to Get the Train Working in Big Walk (Turn It On, Then Move It)

By DayOneFix Editorial · August 24, 2026

Nothing is broken and there is no ignition switch on board. Big Walk’s three trains — red, yellow and green — stay parked until someone completes the Blue Tower key chain and slots that key into the main train station. Insert it once and all three start looping the island at the same time. After that, the only train control that exists is a lever inside the first carriage, which you pull and hold to stop the train, not to start it.

This page answers all three ways people ask about it, because they’re one question.

Everything below the official section is community-documented. House House has never published a walkthrough, a map or an item list for Big Walk, so the coordinates and puzzle names here come from players — we say plainly which is which.

How to turn on the train in Big Walk

The switch you’re looking for is not on the train. It’s a key slot at the main train station, which Steam guide author fireboundfox places at map coordinates 3380, 1740 — northwest of the Blue Tower, tucked into the side of the mountain.

The station takes one item: a control panel key cut to the Blue Tower’s shape. Push it into the slot and the red train on the track in front of you starts rolling; the green and yellow trains start moving elsewhere on the island at the same moment. There is no per-train activation and no second step.

So “how do I turn on the train” resolves to “how do I get the Blue Tower key”, which is the next section.

How to get the train to work: the Blue Tower key chain

The Big Walk railway sits behind the same three-stage lock every colour area uses:

1. Solve five puzzles for control panel pieces. Each puzzle you finish rewards one red piece. Community guides list five convenient ones clustered around the Blue Tower, but fireboundfox is explicit that this is a shortlist, not a requirement: “you can get the control panel pieces from any puzzle you solve.”
2. Slot all five into the control panel on top of the Blue Tower (coordinates 3540, 1850). With the fifth piece in place, a golden key is released from the back of the panel.
3. Cut the key at five key cutters. Start at the cutter by the tower door. After each cut the top of the machine shifts to reveal an arrow pointing at the next one, walking you down the mountain. The fifth arrow points at the train station access point.

That third stage is where groups most often think they’re stuck. A key that has only been through two or three cutters is not yet the right shape and simply will not go into the station slot — it isn’t a bug, and there’s no way to skip ahead. Follow the arrows.

The five puzzles the guide uses, with the mechanic each one tests, so you know what you’re walking into:

Higher player counts do not change any of this. Screen Hype’s write-up notes that more players mean more objective targets — extra switches, higher point requirements — while the solution logic stays identical, which matches House House’s own FAQ line that the world only has 2-player, 3-player and 4-plus-player configurations.

How to move the train in Big Walk (and how to stop it)

Once unlocked, the trains move on their own, forever. They run a continuous loop around the track, always in the same direction, and you don’t drive them. Riding one is just a matter of standing on the platform and stepping aboard.

The one control that exists is a lever inside the first carriage. Pull and hold it to stop the train; let go and it resumes. That’s it — no throttle, no direction change, no way to reverse.

Two practical consequences:

• You can’t summon a train. If it just left, you wait for the loop. There are only three of them for the whole island.
• The lever is a stopping tool, not a station tool. Its real use is halting a train somewhere it doesn’t normally stop so somebody can get on or off.

If you step onto a moving train, the Steam achievement Big Ride (“Ride the train”) unlocks. As of 2026-08-24, Steam’s global stats put Big Ride at 31.3% — so roughly two thirds of everyone who has launched Big Walk has never got the railway running.

Is it a train or a monorail?

Both names are in circulation and the guides disagree. fireboundfox and Screen Hype call them trains with a main train station; the author of the Steam 100% achievement guide, tasselfoot, calls the same system the monorail and the same building the Monorail Station. There is no official name — the achievement itself just says “Ride the train,” which is the closest thing to a ruling.

Worth knowing before you invest an evening in it: tasselfoot’s verdict is that the railway is not actually a good way to get around, “pretty unhelpful given how slow it moves and how few trains there are,” and recommends the tunnels instead. Unlock the trains for the achievement and the novelty, not for the commute.

Why your train still isn’t moving

Working through the usual causes, cheapest first:

• The key isn’t fully cut. Five cutters, in arrow order. This is the single most common cause.
• You’re at the wrong tower. Red unlocks the Map Room, Green the chairlift, Yellow the tunnels, Blue the trains, Black the endgame. That colour mapping comes from a community guide (Steam user Fish), not from the game.
• You inserted the key and only checked one train. The other two are elsewhere on the loop and will already be moving.
• You’re looking for a control in the carriage. The lever stops the train; it never starts one.
• Your session dropped and the progress went with it. Progress is saved by the host only, per the official FAQ, so if a different person hosted your last session you’re on a different save — see black screen and missing saves.

FAQ

How do you turn on the train in Big Walk? Insert a cut Blue Tower control panel key into the slot at the main train station, northwest of the Blue Tower. All three trains — red, yellow and green — start running at once. There is no control on the train itself that starts it.

How do you move the train in Big Walk? You don’t. Once unlocked, the trains loop the track continuously in one fixed direction. The only control is a lever in the first carriage that you pull and hold to stop the train.

How do you get the train to work if it’s still parked? Almost always because the key hasn’t been through all five key cutters. Each cutter reveals an arrow pointing at the next; a partly cut key won’t fit the station slot.

How many trains are there in Big Walk? Three — red, yellow and green — sharing one loop, per community walkthroughs. Steam’s achievement Big Ride unlocks when you step onto a moving one.

Do you need more players to unlock the train? No. The world adjusts to 2, 3 or 4-plus players, and community guides report that larger groups just get more targets to hit, not different puzzles.

Related

• How to get the key and open the Map Room
• Big Walk controls: arms, backpack, belt and colour
• Every item in Big Walk and what it does
• How long Big Walk takes to beat
• Big Walk guide hub

Sources

The player-count scaling of the world (a 2-player, 3-player or 4-plus-player version chosen by the host) and host-side autosaving are the developers’ own words in the official Big Walk FAQ, checked 2026-08-24. The achievement Big Ride — “Ride the train” and its 31.3% global completion rate come from Steam’s public achievement stats for app 1478500, read 2026-08-24; that figure moves over time.

Everything about the mechanism itself is community documentation, because House House publishes none. The three trains being red, yellow and green, running a continuous one-direction loop, being controlled by a pull-and-hold lever in the first carriage, and staying inert until unlocked; the main train station at 3380, 1740; the Blue Tower at 3540, 1850; the five-piece control panel; the five key cutters and their arrows; the note that pieces can come from any puzzle; and the coordinates and mechanics of the five listed puzzles all come from fireboundfox’s Steam guide How to Unlock the Trains and the full version of it by Lyssa Greywood at Screen Hype, both checked 2026-08-24. The line about higher player counts meaning more targets rather than different puzzles is Screen Hype’s, and we have not independently tested it at 12 players.

The “monorail” naming, the Monorail Station, and the judgement that the railway is slow and less useful than the tunnels come from tasselfoot’s Big Walk 100% Achievement Guide on Steam, checked 2026-08-24 — the same guide that supplies the tower-to-unlock mapping, which is also summarised in Steam user Fish’s short guide BIG WALK GUIDE. Where those authors disagree with each other on naming we have said so rather than picking one. Chinese-language coverage confirms the unlock exists but adds no mechanics: on Bilibili, Perotto’s 【Big Walk】解锁火车！-3 (BV1UwuT64E5u, 2,868 plays) is gameplay footage without commentary of the steps. We found no coverage of the train mechanism at all on WeChat via 搜狗微信 search.