Streaming Star Dedicates Thirty-Seven Hours Trying to Conquer <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a One Stick

One could think that two years post-launch since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have exhausted novel challenge runs that impose unique restrictions on a gameplay session. However, although numerous players have tried to finish the game with only a stick, content creator PointCrow holds the record as the player who aimed to beat the game with a one branch—meaning, the very same one from start to finish.

The streamer is famous for these kinds of challenge runs, like the instance he played the game solely with bombs or the effort where he aimed to beat the game with no energy. A single stick run, though, sounds unfeasible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which forces the hero to wield the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the whole weapon wear mechanic, which is especially important when dealing with the weakest weapon in the entire world. But if the branch breaks, that's it. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

So, how? The simple explanation is glitches. The complete answer, believe it or not, is alternate dimensions. It turns out, you can tweak the game's saving mechanism to have separate game sessions that affect one another. So the creator does a “setup” file where he advances standardly, and the real file, where he's limited. The setup save has him completing the intro and first tutorial island, and this character acquires maximum stamina and health. From this point, he starts a cinematic and pauses midway through to tell the game to load an auto-save from the stick file. The system gets mixed up and generates a new save file that combines the conditions of the first two files.

This causes fresh problems, however. The merged save file has a Link that never obtain the ability to access shrines. Luckily, this is something that the save glitch addresses readily, but pulling it off means depending on an unstable version of the game that fails to load certain areas. As with other obstacles, he has a technical workaround for it: He begins the game on its pre-release version 1.0, and then updates the game partway through to make sure it begins working properly.

Overcoming Durability and Additional Hurdles

Interestingly, the introductory form of Link is coded so that he is unable to break any weapons he wields, likely to avoid a situation where the user gets stuck at the beginning of the game. But that's additionally how PointCrow gets around the wear problem, as the Link he transfers between universes is the version from the start of the game. It's a smart technique, but not one that eradicates all potential friction. The stick is nonetheless a ineffective item that makes battles tedious. But at that point, it's all a question of determination and perseverance. It also aids that there's a duplication glitch that gives him an abundant number of consumables to improve his attack, or accumulate on revival fairies. He additionally makes use of a bug that enables him to clip through the environment. Some would find these means reason to discredit the legitimacy of the run, but to my view, he's a resourceful player who is ready to do anything necessary to entertain his viewer. He further implements a penalty of sorts stating that, for each spirit he uses, he'll remove one viewer from his Twitch chat, establishing an motivation to avoid overly rely on them.

Major Battles and the Last Showdown

PointCrow manages to defeat many of Tears of the Kingdom's bosses, but the battles look grueling. The YouTube version of his journey spares the viewer sit through the whole fights, which is a good thing when a few of them take multiple hours. A particular enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, requires an incredible twenty-three hours. The Ganondorf battle, which depletes Link's hearts as it unfolds, is a notable nail-biter. The unbreakable stick is still only a piece of wood. He can't necessarily clone objects midway the fight.

Did he succeed? Technically, he does overcome the dragon version of the antagonist. But the game compels the user to use the Master Sword as the final attack, so technically, it's not completely a branch-exclusive playthrough. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, PointCrow banned more than a thousand users in his Twitch chat. Rest in peace.