Twitch Personality Dedicates Thirty-Seven Straight Attempting to Conquer <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a One Stick

One could think that two years post-launch since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have exhausted novel challenge runs that impose unique rules on a gameplay session. However, although many gamers have tried to finish Tears of the Kingdom with only a stick, streamer the streamer stands out as the player who endeavored to clear the adventure with a one branch—specifically, the exact same one throughout.

PointCrow is renowned for such challenge runs, like the time he went through the title using only explosives or the attempt where he tried to defeat the game with no stamina. A one-branch run, though, seems unfeasible at face value. There's the game's introduction, which requires Link to use the Master Sword. Then, there's the whole durability system, which is especially relevant when working with the most fragile tool in the whole world. Yet if the branch breaks, that's the end. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

So, how? The straightforward answer is exploits. The full story, believe it or not, is alternate dimensions. It turns out, you can manipulate Tears of the Kingdom's save file system to have distinct game sessions that affect one another. So PointCrow does a “setup” file where he progresses normally, and the real file, where he's restricted. The setup file has him going through the prologue and first tutorial island, and this character gains full stamina and hearts. From this point, he starts a cutscene and pauses partway through to instruct the game to open an auto-save from the stick file. The game gets mixed up and creates a new game file that merges the conditions of the original two.

This creates new problems, however. The merged save file has a Link that did not obtain the capability to access shrines. Fortunately, this is something that the save glitch addresses readily, but executing it means relying on an buggy build of the game that fails to open some locations. Like other obstacles, he has a clever workaround for it: He starts the game on its early version 1.0, and then updates the software partway through to ensure it starts working properly.

Overcoming Durability and Additional Hurdles

Interestingly, the introductory form of the hero is programmed so that he is unable to damage any tools he uses, presumably to prevent a situation where the user gets trapped at the start of the game. But that's additionally how PointCrow gets around the durability issue, as the Link he pulls across universes is the one from the start of the story. It's a clever technique, but not a method that eradicates all possible difficulty. The stick is still a weak weapon that makes battles onerous. But at that point, it's entirely a matter of grit and dedication. It further helps that there's a copying exploit that gives him an plentiful number of items to boost his strength, or accumulate on revival fairies. He additionally employs a glitch that allows him to phase through the environment. A few would find these methods reason to discredit the legitimacy of the attempt, but to my view, he's a resourceful gamer who is ready to do whatever it takes to entertain his viewer. He further implements a penalty of kinds stipulating that, for every spirit he uses, he'll ban one fan from his Twitch chat, creating an incentive to not overly rely on them.

Major Battles and the Final Showdown

The streamer manages to defeat many of Tears of the Kingdom's main enemies, but the fights look painful. The YouTube version of his quest spares the viewer endure the whole fights, which is a blessing when some of them take several hours. One enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an incredible twenty-three straight. The final villain battle, which erases the hero's hearts as it unfolds, is a memorable nail-biter. The unbreakable stick is after all only a piece of wood. He is unable to always duplicate objects midway the fight.

Did he succeed? In a matter of speaking, PointCrow manages to defeat the dragon version of the antagonist. But the software compels the player to wield the Master Sword as the final attack, so strictly speaking, it's not quite fully a branch-exclusive run. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, PointCrow banned more than a thousand people in his Twitch chat. RIP.