Streaming Personality Dedicates 37 Straight Attempting to Beat <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a Single Branch

One could think that after two years since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom arrived, fans would have run out of creative challenge runs that impose special restrictions on a playthrough. However, although many players have tried to complete the game using only a stick, content creator the streamer stands out as the player who aimed to clear the adventure with a one stick—specifically, the very same one from start to finish.

The streamer is famous for these kinds of challenge runs, such as the time he went through the game using only bombs or the attempt where he tried to defeat the story with zero stamina. A single stick playthrough, however, sounds impossible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which requires the hero to wield the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the entire durability mechanic, which is especially relevant when dealing with the most fragile weapon in the entire game. But if the branch breaks, that's the end. It's over.

So, How?

So, how? The straightforward answer is exploits. The complete answer, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. It turns out, you can manipulate the game's saving mechanism to have separate playthroughs that impact one another. So PointCrow creates a “preparation” save where he progresses standardly, and the real file, where he's restricted. The preparatory save has him completing the intro and initial starting area, and this character acquires full endurance and hearts. From this point, he starts a cinematic and halts midway through to instruct the game to open an auto-save from the stick file. The game gets mixed up and creates a new save file that combines the states of the original two.

That creates fresh problems, however. The fused file has a Link that did not obtain the ability to enter shrines. Fortunately, this is an issue that the save glitch fixes readily, but pulling it off means depending on an unstable build of the game that refuses to load some locations. As with other obstacles, he has a technical workaround for it: He begins the game on its early version 1.0, and then updates the game partway through to make sure it begins functioning correctly.

Bypassing Durability and Other Challenges

Curiously, the prologue form of Link is coded so that he cannot damage any tools he uses, likely to avoid a scenario where the user gets trapped at the start of the game. But that's also how PointCrow gets around the wear issue, as the character he pulls across universes is the version from the start of the story. It's a smart technique, but not a method that eliminates all possible difficulty. The stick is nonetheless a ineffective item that renders encounters tedious. But at that point, it's all a matter of determination and perseverance. It also helps that there's a duplication glitch that grants him an plentiful number of items to boost his attack, or accumulate on healing spirits. He additionally makes use of a bug that allows him to phase through the world. A few would consider these means grounds to question the legitimacy of the run, but in my mind, he's a resourceful player who is ready to do anything necessary to engage his viewer. He further uses a safeguard of kinds stating that, for every fairy he uses, he'll remove one viewer from his live stream, establishing an incentive to not depend too much on them.

Major Battles and the Final Encounter

PointCrow succeeds to defeat several of the game's bosses, but the battles look grueling. The video edit of his quest doesn't make the viewer endure the whole fights, which is a good thing when some of them take several hours. A particular enemy encounter, a powerful foe, requires an incredible 23 hours. The Ganondorf showdown, which erases the hero's health as it unfolds, is a memorable nail-biter. The unbreakable branch is after all only a piece of wood. He can't necessarily duplicate objects during the fight.

Did he succeed? In a matter of speaking, he manages to defeat the beast form of the antagonist. But the software compels the player to use the legendary weapon as the last attack, so strictly speaking, it's not fully a stick-only run. But what fun is that?

In the end, the streamer banned over a thousand people in his live stream. Rest in peace.