Streaming Star Dedicates 37 Straight Attempting to Conquer <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a One Stick

You might assume that after two years since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have run out of creative self-imposed challenges that apply special rules on a gameplay session. Yet, while many gamers have tried to finish Tears of the Kingdom using just a wooden stick, streamer PointCrow holds the record as the individual who aimed to clear the adventure with a one branch—specifically, the exact same one throughout.

PointCrow is renowned for these kinds of challenge runs, like the time he played the title using only bombs or the effort where he aimed to beat the story with no stamina. A single stick playthrough, though, seems unfeasible at face value. There's the opening sequence, which requires Link to wield the Master Sword. Then, there's the whole weapon wear system, which is especially relevant when dealing with the weakest weapon in the whole world. But if the stick breaks, that's the end. It's over.

So, How?

How did he do it? The straightforward explanation is exploits. The full story, believe it or not, is parallel universes. It turns out, you can manipulate Tears of the Kingdom's save file system to have separate game sessions that affect one another. So the creator does a “preparation” file where he advances standardly, and the real save, where he's limited. The setup file has him going through the intro and first starting area, and this character gains full stamina and hearts. From this point, he triggers a cutscene and halts partway through to instruct the game to load an auto-save from the branch-only file. The game gets mixed up and creates a third save file that merges the conditions of the first two files.

This creates fresh issues, however. The fused file has a protagonist that never acquired the ability to enter sacred places. Luckily, this is something that the file exploit fixes easily, but executing it means depending on an unstable version of the title that refuses to load some areas. Like other obstacles, he has a clever workaround for it: He starts the game on its early 1.0 build, and then patches the software midway through to make sure it begins functioning correctly.

Overcoming Durability and Other Hurdles

Curiously, the introductory version of the hero is programmed so that he cannot break any tools he uses, likely to avoid a situation where the player gets trapped at the start of the game. But that's also how PointCrow gets around the durability problem, as the character he pulls between universes is the one from the beginning of the game. It's a clever technique, but not one that eliminates all potential difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a ineffective weapon that renders battles tedious. But at that point, it's entirely a matter of grit and perseverance. It further aids that there's a copying exploit that grants him an abundant supply of items to boost his attack, or accumulate on revival fairies. He also makes use of a bug that enables Link to phase through the environment. A few would consider these means grounds to question the validity of the run, but in my mind, he's a inventive player who is ready to do whatever it takes to entertain his audience. He further implements a penalty of sorts stipulating that, for every spirit he uses, he'll ban one fan from his Twitch chat, establishing an motivation to avoid overly rely on them.

Major Battles and the Last Encounter

PointCrow succeeds to get through many of the game's main enemies, but the battles look grueling. The video edit of his quest spares the viewer sit through the whole fights, which is a blessing when a few of them take several hours. One enemy encounter, a powerful foe, takes an astonishing 23 hours. The final villain battle, which depletes Link's hearts as it progresses, is a memorable tense moment. The unbreakable branch is after all just a stick. He can't always clone items during the fight.

So, is it possible? In a matter of speaking, PointCrow does defeat the dragon version of the antagonist. But the game compels the player to use the Master Sword as the final attack, so technically, it's not quite fully a branch-exclusive run. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, the streamer removed over 1,000 users in his live stream. RIP.