Streaming Personality Dedicates 37 Hours Attempting to Beat <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a One Stick

You might assume that after two years since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom debuted, fans would have run out of creative challenge runs that apply special rules on a gameplay session. However, although numerous gamers have tried to finish Tears of the Kingdom with just a wooden stick, content creator PointCrow stands out as the individual who aimed to clear the game with a one branch—meaning, the exact same stick throughout.

The streamer is renowned for such difficult playthroughs, like the instance he went through the title using only explosives or the effort where he aimed to defeat the story with no stamina. A one-branch playthrough, however, seems unfeasible at face value. There's the opening sequence, which forces the hero to wield the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the entire weapon wear system, which is particularly relevant when working with the most fragile tool in the whole game. Yet if the branch shatters, that's the end. It's over.

So, How?

So, how? The straightforward answer is glitches. The full answer, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's save file system to have distinct playthroughs that impact one another. So the creator does a “setup” file where he progresses normally, and the actual file, where he's restricted. The setup save has him going through the prologue and first starting area, and this Link acquires maximum endurance and hearts. From here, he triggers a cinematic and pauses partway through to instruct the game to open an automatic save from the branch-only file. The system gets confused and creates a third save file that combines the conditions of the first two files.

That causes new problems, however. The fused save file has a protagonist that did not acquired the ability to access shrines. Luckily, this is an issue that the save glitch addresses readily, but executing it means relying on an buggy build of the title that fails to open some areas. Like everything else, he has a clever workaround for it: He begins Tears of the Kingdom on its early version 1.0, and then updates the game partway through to make sure it begins working properly.

Overcoming Durability and Other Hurdles

Interestingly, the introductory form of the hero is coded so that he cannot damage any weapons he wields, likely to avoid a situation where the player gets stuck at the start of the adventure. But that's additionally how the streamer bypasses the durability problem, as the Link he transfers between dimensions is the one from the start of the story. It's a smart technique, but not a method that eliminates all potential difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a weak item that makes battles onerous. But at that point, it's all a question of grit and dedication. It also helps that there's a duplication glitch that gives him an abundant supply of consumables to improve his strength, or stock up on revival fairies. He also employs a glitch that enables him to clip through the world. Some would find these means grounds to discredit the validity of the attempt, but in my mind, he's a resourceful player who is ready to do anything necessary to entertain his audience. He further uses a safeguard of sorts stipulating that, for every fairy he uses, he'll ban a fan from his live stream, creating an motivation to avoid overly rely on them.

Boss Fights and the Final Encounter

PointCrow succeeds to get through several of Tears of the Kingdom's main enemies, but the fights appear painful. The video version of his journey doesn't make the audience sit through the entire fights, which is a blessing when a few of them take multiple hours. A particular enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, requires an astonishing 23 straight. The final villain showdown, which erases Link's hearts as it unfolds, is a memorable nail-biter. The unbreakable stick is after all just a piece of wood. He is unable to always clone objects midway the battle.

Did he succeed? In a matter of speaking, PointCrow manages to overcome the beast form of Ganon. But the game compels the user to wield the Master Sword as the last strike, so technically, it's not quite completely a branch-exclusive playthrough. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, the streamer banned over 1,000 users in his live stream. Rest in peace.