Twitch Star Spends Thirty-Seven Hours Attempting to Beat <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a Single Branch

You might assume that after two years since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have exhausted novel challenge runs that impose special rules on a playthrough. Yet, while numerous gamers have tried to complete the game using only a stick, streamer the streamer stands out as the individual who endeavored to beat the game with a one stick—specifically, the exact same one from start to finish.

The streamer is famous for these kinds of difficult playthroughs, like the instance he played the title using only explosives or the attempt where he aimed to defeat the game with no energy. A single stick run, though, sounds unfeasible at face value. There's the opening sequence, which forces the hero to wield the Master Sword. Then, there's the entire weapon wear system, which is particularly important when dealing with the weakest weapon in the whole world. But if the branch shatters, that's it. It's over.

The Method Behind the Madness

How did he do it? The simple answer is exploits. The full story, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have distinct game sessions that affect one another. So PointCrow does a “setup” save where he advances standardly, and the actual save, where he's limited. The preparatory file has him going through the prologue and first starting area, and this Link gains maximum endurance and health. From here, he starts a cutscene and halts partway through to instruct the software to open an auto-save from the branch-only file. The system gets confused and generates a new save file that combines the conditions of the first two files.

That causes fresh problems, however. The fused file has a protagonist that did not acquired the ability to access shrines. Fortunately, this is something that the file exploit addresses readily, but pulling it off means relying on an unstable version of the game that fails to load some areas. As with other obstacles, he has a technical solution for it: He begins Tears of the Kingdom on its pre-release version 1.0, and then patches the software midway through to make sure it begins working properly.

Overcoming Weapon Wear and Other Hurdles

Interestingly, the prologue form of Link is programmed so that he cannot break any tools he wields, likely to avoid a situation where the player gets stuck at the start of the game. But that's additionally how PointCrow gets around the durability issue, as the Link he pulls between universes is the one from the beginning of the story. It's a clever trick, but not a method that eradicates all possible difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a ineffective weapon that renders encounters onerous. But at that point, it's all a matter of grit and dedication. It further aids that there's a copying exploit that gives him an abundant number of consumables to boost his attack, or stock up on revival fairies. He additionally makes use of a bug that enables him to clip through the world. A few would find these means reason to question the validity of the attempt, but to my view, he's a inventive player who is willing to do whatever it takes to engage his viewer. He also implements a safeguard of sorts stipulating that, for every spirit he uses, he'll remove one viewer from his live stream, creating an incentive to not depend too much on them.

Major Battles and the Last Encounter

PointCrow manages to get through many of the game's bosses, but the fights appear grueling. The video version of his journey doesn't make the audience sit through the entire conflicts, which is a blessing when some of them last multiple long hours. A particular enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an astonishing 23 hours. The final villain battle, which erases the hero's health as it progresses, is a notable tense moment. The unbreakable branch is after all only a stick. He is unable to necessarily duplicate items midway the fight.

So, is it possible? Technically, PointCrow does overcome the dragon version of Ganon. But the software forces the user to wield the legendary weapon as the last strike, so technically, it's not quite completely a stick-only run. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, the streamer removed more than 1,000 people in his live stream. RIP.