Twitch Star Dedicates 37 Straight Trying to Conquer <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a Single Stick

One could think that after two years since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom arrived, fans would have exhausted novel self-imposed challenges that apply unique rules on a playthrough. Yet, although many gamers have attempted to complete Tears of the Kingdom using only a stick, streamer PointCrow stands out as the individual who aimed to clear the adventure with a single branch—meaning, the exact same stick throughout.

PointCrow is renowned for such difficult playthroughs, such as the instance he played the game using only bombs or the attempt where he tried to beat the game with zero stamina. A one-branch run, though, sounds unfeasible at first glance. There's the game's introduction, which forces Link to use the legendary blade. Then, there's the whole durability system, which is particularly important when dealing with the weakest tool in the entire game. But if the stick breaks, that's the end. Game over.

So, How?

How did he do it? The straightforward explanation is glitches. The full story, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have distinct playthroughs that affect one another. So PointCrow creates a “preparation” save where he advances standardly, and the real save, where he's restricted. The setup file has him completing the intro and first starting area, and this character acquires maximum stamina and health. From here, he starts a cutscene and pauses partway through to instruct the game to load an automatic save from the stick file. The system gets confused and generates a new game file that merges the conditions of the original two.

That causes fresh problems, though. The fused save file has a protagonist that never obtain the ability to enter sacred places. Luckily, this is something that the file exploit addresses readily, but pulling it off means relying on an buggy build of the title that refuses to open some locations. As with everything else, he has a clever solution for it: He starts the game on its early version 1.0, and then updates the game midway through to make sure it begins working properly.

Overcoming Durability and Additional Hurdles

Curiously, the introductory form of Link is coded so that he cannot break any tools he wields, presumably to prevent a situation where the user gets trapped at the start of the adventure. But that's additionally how the streamer bypasses the wear problem, as the character he pulls between dimensions is the one from the beginning of the story. It's a smart technique, but not one that eradicates all possible friction. The stick is nonetheless a weak item that renders encounters onerous. But at that point, it's all a question of grit and perseverance. It further helps that there's a copying exploit that gives him an abundant supply of consumables to improve his strength, or stock up on healing spirits. He also makes use of a bug that allows him to phase through the world. A few would find these means grounds to discredit the validity of the run, but in my mind, he's a inventive gamer who is willing to do whatever it takes to engage his audience. He further uses a penalty of sorts stating that, for every spirit he employs, he'll remove one fan from his live stream, creating an incentive to avoid depend too much on them.

Major Battles and the Final Encounter

The streamer manages to defeat several of Tears of the Kingdom's bosses, but the fights look painful. The YouTube version of his quest spares the viewer sit through the whole fights, which is a good thing when some of them last several hours. A particular boss fight, Queen Gibdo, takes an astonishing 23 straight. The Ganondorf battle, which erases the hero's hearts as it unfolds, is a notable tense moment. The indestructible stick is after all only a stick. He is unable to always clone objects during the fight.

So, is it possible? In a matter of speaking, PointCrow does defeat the beast form of Ganon. But the software compels the user to use the Master Sword as the final strike, so strictly speaking, it's not quite completely a branch-exclusive run. But what fun is that?

When everything is said and done, PointCrow removed over a thousand people in his live stream. RIP.