Streaming Personality Spends 37 Hours Attempting to Conquer <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a Single Branch

One could think that after two years since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have exhausted novel challenge runs that impose special rules on a playthrough. Yet, although numerous gamers have tried to finish the game using only a stick, streamer the streamer stands out as the player who aimed to clear the game with a one stick—specifically, the exact same one throughout.

PointCrow is renowned for these kinds of challenge runs, such as the instance he went through the game using only explosives or the effort where he aimed to defeat the game with no stamina. A one-branch playthrough, though, sounds impossible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which requires the hero to wield the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the whole durability mechanic, which is particularly important when working with the most fragile weapon in the entire world. But if the stick shatters, that's it. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

How did he do it? The simple answer is glitches. The full story, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can manipulate Tears of the Kingdom's save file system to have separate playthroughs that affect one another. So the creator does a “preparation” file where he progresses normally, and the real file, where he's restricted. The setup file has him going through the intro and first tutorial island, and this character acquires full stamina and hearts. From this point, he triggers a cinematic and pauses midway through to instruct the game to open an auto-save from the stick file. The system gets confused and creates a third save file that merges the states of the first two files.

This causes fresh problems, however. The merged file has a Link that did not obtain the ability to enter sacred places. Fortunately, this is something that the file exploit fixes easily, but executing it means relying on an buggy version of the game that refuses to load some areas. Like other obstacles, he has a technical workaround for it: He begins Tears of the Kingdom on its pre-release 1.0 build, and then updates the game midway through to make sure it starts working properly.

Bypassing Weapon Wear and Additional Hurdles

Curiously, the prologue version of Link is programmed so that he is unable to break any weapons he wields, likely to avoid a situation where the player gets stuck at the start of the adventure. But that's additionally how PointCrow gets around the durability issue, as the Link he pulls across universes is the version from the beginning of the game. It's a clever technique, but not a method that eradicates all possible friction. The branch is still a ineffective weapon that makes encounters onerous. But at that point, it's entirely a matter of grit and dedication. It further helps that there's a duplication glitch that grants him an abundant supply of items to boost his attack, or accumulate on healing spirits. He also employs a glitch that allows him to phase through the world. Some would find these methods reason to question the validity of the run, but in my mind, he's a resourceful player who is ready to do anything necessary to entertain his viewer. He further implements a penalty of kinds stipulating that, for every spirit he uses, he'll ban a fan from his live stream, establishing an motivation to avoid depend too much on them.

Boss Fights and the Last Encounter

PointCrow succeeds to defeat many of Tears of the Kingdom's main enemies, but the battles look painful. The video edit of his quest spares the viewer sit through the whole fights, which is a blessing when some of them last multiple hours. A particular enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an astonishing 23 hours. The final villain battle, which erases Link's hearts as it unfolds, is a notable tense moment. The unbreakable branch is after all just a stick. He is unable to always clone objects during the fight.

Did he succeed? In a matter of speaking, he manages to overcome the dragon version of the antagonist. But the game forces the player to wield the legendary weapon as the last strike, so strictly speaking, it's not completely a stick-only run. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, the streamer banned more than 1,000 users in his live stream. RIP.