Streaming Personality Dedicates Thirty-Seven Hours Attempting 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 debuted, fans would have exhausted creative self-imposed challenges that impose unique restrictions on a playthrough. Yet, although numerous players have tried to complete the game with only a stick, streamer PointCrow stands out as the individual who aimed to clear the adventure with a single branch—meaning, the exact same one from start to finish.

PointCrow is renowned for these kinds of challenge runs, such as the instance he went through the title using only bombs or the attempt where he aimed to defeat the game with zero stamina. A one-branch run, though, seems unfeasible at first glance. There's the game's introduction, which forces the hero to use the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the entire weapon wear mechanic, which is particularly important when dealing with the weakest tool in the whole game. But if the branch shatters, that's the end. It's over.

So, How?

So, how? The straightforward answer is exploits. The complete story, I kid you not, is parallel universes. It turns out, you can tweak the game's save file system to have separate playthroughs that affect one another. So the creator does a “setup” file where he progresses normally, and the actual save, where he's limited. The preparatory save has him completing the prologue and initial starting area, and this character acquires maximum endurance and health. From here, he starts a cinematic and pauses midway through to instruct the software to load an automatic save from the branch-only file. The system gets mixed up and generates a third game file that merges the states of the first two files.

This causes new problems, however. The merged file has a protagonist that never acquired the capability to enter sacred places. Luckily, this is something that the file exploit addresses easily, but pulling it off means relying on an unstable build of the game that refuses to load some locations. Like everything else, he has a clever solution for it: He starts Tears of the Kingdom on its early 1.0 build, and then updates the software partway through to make sure it starts working properly.

Overcoming Durability and Additional Challenges

Curiously, the prologue form of Link is programmed so that he cannot damage any tools he wields, presumably to prevent a scenario where the player gets stuck at the start of the adventure. But that's additionally how the streamer bypasses the wear issue, as the Link he transfers between dimensions is the version from the start of the story. It's a smart trick, but not one that eradicates all potential friction. The branch is still a ineffective weapon that makes encounters onerous. But at that stage, it's entirely a matter of grit and dedication. It also helps that there's a copying exploit that grants him an abundant supply of consumables to improve his strength, or accumulate on revival fairies. He also makes use of a glitch that enables Link to clip through the world. Some would consider these methods grounds to question the legitimacy of the run, but in my mind, he's a inventive gamer who is ready to do anything necessary to engage his viewer. He further uses a safeguard of sorts stipulating that, for each fairy he employs, he'll ban a viewer from his live stream, establishing an incentive to not depend too much on them.

Major Battles and the Last Encounter

The streamer succeeds to get through several of the game's bosses, but the battles look grueling. The YouTube version of his journey spares the viewer sit through the entire fights, which is a good thing when a few of them last multiple hours. One enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an incredible 23 straight. The final villain showdown, which erases the hero's hearts as it progresses, is a memorable tense moment. The unbreakable branch is after all just a piece of wood. He can't always clone items midway the fight.

Did he succeed? In a matter of speaking, PointCrow manages to overcome the dragon version of Ganon. But the game forces the user to use the Master Sword as the last strike, so technically, it's not quite fully a stick-only run. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, PointCrow removed over 1,000 users in his Twitch chat. Rest in peace.