Streaming Personality Dedicates 37 Straight Trying to Conquer <em>The Legend of Zelda: 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 exhausted creative challenge runs that apply unique restrictions on a playthrough. Yet, while numerous gamers have tried to complete Tears of the Kingdom with just a stick, content creator the streamer stands out as the individual who aimed to clear the game with a single stick—specifically, the very same stick from start to finish.

The streamer is famous for such difficult playthroughs, like the time he played the title solely with bombs or the attempt where he tried to beat the game with zero energy. A one-branch playthrough, however, sounds unfeasible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which forces Link to use the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the entire weapon wear system, which is especially relevant when dealing with the weakest tool in the whole game. Yet if the stick shatters, that's the end. It's over.

The Method Behind the Madness

So, how? The straightforward explanation is exploits. The full story, I kid you not, is parallel universes. It turns out, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have separate playthroughs that impact one another. So PointCrow does a “setup” file where he advances normally, and the actual save, where he's limited. The setup save has him completing the intro and first tutorial island, and this character acquires full endurance and hearts. From this point, he triggers a cutscene and pauses midway through to tell the game to load an auto-save from the stick file. The system gets mixed up and creates a new game file that merges the conditions of the first two files.

This creates new problems, however. The fused save file has a Link that did not acquired the capability to access sacred places. Fortunately, this is an issue that the file exploit fixes easily, but pulling it off means relying on an buggy build of the game that fails to open certain areas. As with other obstacles, he has a technical solution for it: He starts Tears of the Kingdom on its early 1.0 build, and then patches the game midway through to ensure it starts working properly.

Overcoming Durability and Other Hurdles

Curiously, the prologue form of the hero is programmed so that he cannot break any weapons he uses, likely to avoid a scenario where the player gets stuck at the beginning of the game. But that's also how PointCrow gets around the durability issue, as the Link he transfers between dimensions is the one from the start of the story. It's a clever technique, but not one that eliminates all possible friction. The branch is still a ineffective item that makes encounters tedious. But at that point, it's entirely a question of determination and dedication. It further aids that there's a copying exploit that gives him an abundant supply of consumables to boost his strength, or stock up on healing spirits. He also employs a glitch that enables him to phase through the environment. A few would find these means grounds to question the legitimacy of the attempt, but to my view, he's a inventive gamer who is ready to do whatever it takes to engage his viewer. He further uses a penalty of sorts stating that, for each fairy he employs, he'll remove one fan from his live stream, establishing an motivation to not overly rely on them.

Boss Fights and the Last Encounter

PointCrow succeeds to defeat many of Tears of the Kingdom's main enemies, but the battles look painful. The video edit of his journey spares the audience endure the whole conflicts, which is a good thing when some of them take several long hours. A particular boss fight, a powerful foe, takes an incredible 23 straight. The Ganondorf showdown, which depletes Link's health as it unfolds, is a memorable nail-biter. The indestructible stick is still only a stick. He is unable to necessarily clone objects midway the battle.

Did he succeed? Technically, PointCrow does overcome the dragon version of Ganon. But the software forces the user to wield 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 banned over a thousand people in his live stream. Rest in peace.