Streaming Star Dedicates Thirty-Seven Straight Attempting to Beat <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a Single Stick

You might assume that two years post-launch since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have exhausted novel self-imposed challenges that impose unique rules on a gameplay session. However, although many gamers have tried to finish Tears of the Kingdom with just a wooden stick, streamer the streamer stands out as the individual who aimed to beat the game with a one branch—specifically, the exact same stick throughout.

PointCrow is renowned for these kinds of challenge runs, such as the instance he played the game using only explosives or the attempt where he aimed to beat the story with zero energy. A single stick run, though, seems impossible at face value. There's the game's introduction, which requires the hero to use the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the whole weapon wear system, which is especially important when working with the most fragile tool in the whole game. Yet if the stick breaks, that's it. Game over.

So, How?

How did he do it? The simple answer is glitches. The full story, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have separate playthroughs that impact one another. So the creator creates a “preparation” file where he advances standardly, and the real save, where he's limited. The preparatory file has him completing the intro and initial starting area, and this Link acquires maximum endurance and health. From this point, he triggers a cinematic and pauses midway through to tell the game to open an auto-save from the stick file. The game gets confused and creates a new save file that merges the conditions of the original two.

That causes new issues, however. The merged save file has a protagonist that never acquired the ability to enter shrines. Fortunately, this is something that the file exploit fixes easily, but pulling it off means relying on an buggy build of the title that fails to load certain locations. As with everything else, he has a clever solution for it: He starts the game on its early version 1.0, and then updates the software partway through to make sure it begins functioning correctly.

Overcoming Weapon Wear and Additional Hurdles

Curiously, the prologue version of Link is coded so that he is unable to damage any tools he uses, likely to prevent a situation where the player gets trapped at the beginning of the game. But that's additionally how the streamer bypasses the durability problem, as the Link he transfers across universes is the one from the beginning of the story. It's a clever trick, but not one that eradicates all potential difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a ineffective item that renders encounters tedious. But at that point, it's all a question of grit and dedication. It further helps that there's a duplication glitch that gives him an abundant supply of items to boost his strength, or accumulate on healing spirits. He additionally makes use of a bug that enables him to phase through the environment. Some would find these methods grounds to question the validity of the attempt, but to my view, he's a inventive gamer who is willing to do whatever it takes to entertain his viewer. He further implements a penalty of sorts stating that, for each fairy he uses, he'll ban one fan from his Twitch chat, establishing an motivation to avoid overly rely on them.

Major Battles and the Final Showdown

The streamer succeeds to defeat many of the game's bosses, but the battles appear grueling. The video edit of his journey doesn't make the viewer sit through the whole fights, which is a blessing when some of them take several long hours. One enemy encounter, a powerful foe, requires an astonishing 23 straight. The Ganondorf showdown, which erases the hero's hearts as it unfolds, is a notable tense moment. The indestructible branch is after all just a stick. He is unable to always clone items during the fight.

So, is it possible? Technically, he does overcome the beast form of the antagonist. But the game forces the user to wield the Master Sword as the last attack, so technically, it's not quite fully a branch-exclusive run. But what fun is that?

In the end, the streamer banned more than 1,000 users in his Twitch chat. Rest in peace.