Twitch Personality Dedicates 37 Straight Trying to Conquer <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a Single Stick

One could think that after two years since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have exhausted creative self-imposed challenges that apply unique restrictions on a gameplay session. However, although many players have attempted to complete the game using just a stick, content creator the streamer stands out as the player who aimed to beat the adventure with a one stick—meaning, the exact same stick from start to finish.

PointCrow is famous for these kinds of challenge runs, like the instance he went through the title using only bombs or the attempt where he aimed to defeat the game with no stamina. A one-branch playthrough, however, seems impossible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which forces the hero to use the legendary blade. Additionally, there's the entire durability system, which is especially important when working with the most fragile tool in the whole game. Yet if the stick breaks, that's the end. Game over.

So, How?

How did he do it? The simple answer is glitches. The full story, believe it or not, is alternate dimensions. It turns out, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's save file system to have distinct game sessions that impact one another. So the creator does a “setup” save where he progresses normally, and the actual file, where he's restricted. The setup save has him completing the prologue and initial tutorial island, and this character gains maximum endurance and health. From this point, he triggers a cutscene and pauses partway through to tell the software to load an automatic save from the branch-only file. The game gets confused and creates a third game file that merges the conditions of the first two files.

This creates new issues, though. The merged file has a protagonist that never acquired the ability to enter shrines. Luckily, this is an issue that the save glitch addresses readily, but executing it means relying on an unstable version of the title that refuses to open certain locations. As with everything else, he has a technical workaround for it: He starts Tears of the Kingdom on its early 1.0 build, and then updates the game partway through to make sure it starts working properly.

Overcoming Durability and Additional Challenges

Interestingly, the introductory version of Link is programmed so that he cannot damage any weapons he wields, likely to avoid a scenario where the player gets stuck at the start of the game. But that's additionally how the streamer bypasses the wear problem, as the Link he pulls across dimensions is the one from the start of the story. It's a clever trick, but not one that eliminates all potential friction. The stick is still a weak weapon that makes battles onerous. But at that point, it's entirely a matter of grit and perseverance. It further aids that there's a copying exploit that gives him an abundant number of consumables to improve his strength, or stock up on healing spirits. He also employs a bug that enables Link to phase through the world. Some would consider these means grounds to question the validity of the run, but to my view, he's a inventive gamer who is willing to do whatever it takes to engage his viewer. He further uses a safeguard of kinds stating that, for every spirit he uses, he'll ban one fan from his Twitch chat, creating an motivation to avoid depend too much on them.

Boss Fights and the Final Showdown

PointCrow succeeds to get through many of the game's bosses, but the fights appear painful. The YouTube version of his journey doesn't make the viewer endure the entire conflicts, which is a good thing when some of them take several long hours. One boss fight, a powerful foe, takes an astonishing twenty-three hours. The Ganondorf battle, which depletes Link's health as it progresses, is a notable nail-biter. The unbreakable branch is after all only a piece of wood. He is unable to necessarily clone items during the fight.

Did he succeed? Technically, PointCrow does defeat the beast form of Ganon. But the software forces the user to use the legendary weapon as the last strike, so strictly speaking, it's not completely a branch-exclusive playthrough. But where's the challenge in that?

When everything is said and done, PointCrow removed over a thousand users in his live stream. Rest in peace.