Twitch Personality Spends 37 Straight Attempting to Beat <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a Single Branch

You might assume that after two years since Tears of the Kingdom debuted, enthusiasts would have run out of novel challenge runs that apply special restrictions on a playthrough. However, although numerous gamers have attempted to complete the game with only a wooden stick, content creator PointCrow stands out as the player who aimed to clear the game with a one stick—specifically, the exact same stick throughout.

PointCrow is famous for these kinds of challenge runs, such as the instance he went through the title solely with explosives or the attempt where he tried to defeat the story with no energy. A one-branch playthrough, however, seems unfeasible at first glance. There's the game's introduction, which forces the hero to use the legendary blade. Additionally, there's the whole weapon wear system, which is especially relevant when dealing with the weakest tool in the entire game. Yet if the stick shatters, that's the end. Game over.

So, How?

How did he do it? The straightforward answer is glitches. The complete story, believe it or not, is parallel universes. Apparently, you can tweak the game's saving mechanism to have distinct game sessions 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 intro and first starting area, and this Link gains full stamina and hearts. From this point, he triggers a cinematic and halts midway through to instruct the software to open an automatic save from the branch-only file. The system gets mixed up and creates a new game file that merges the states of the original two.

This creates fresh issues, though. The merged file has a protagonist that did not obtain the capability to enter shrines. Fortunately, this is something that the file exploit addresses readily, but executing it means depending on an unstable build of the title that refuses to load some areas. Like other obstacles, he has a technical workaround for it: He begins Tears of the Kingdom on its early 1.0 build, and then patches the game midway through to make sure it starts working properly.

Bypassing Durability and Other Challenges

Interestingly, the prologue version of Link is programmed so that he cannot damage any weapons he uses, presumably to avoid a scenario where the user gets stuck at the beginning of the game. But that's also how PointCrow bypasses the durability issue, as the character he transfers between dimensions is the version from the start of the game. It's a clever trick, but not a method that eradicates all potential difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a ineffective item that makes encounters onerous. But at that stage, it's all a question of grit and perseverance. It also helps that there's a duplication glitch that grants him an plentiful supply of items to improve his strength, or stock up on healing spirits. He also employs a glitch that allows Link to phase through the world. Some would find these methods grounds to question the legitimacy of the run, but in my mind, he's a inventive player who is willing to do anything necessary to entertain his audience. He further uses a penalty of sorts stating that, for every spirit he uses, he'll remove one viewer from his live stream, establishing an motivation to avoid depend too much on them.

Boss Fights and the Final Encounter

PointCrow succeeds to get through many of Tears of the Kingdom's main enemies, but the fights appear grueling. The YouTube version of his journey spares the audience sit through the whole fights, which is a blessing when some of them take multiple hours. A particular enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an incredible twenty-three hours. The Ganondorf battle, which depletes Link's hearts as it progresses, is a memorable tense moment. The unbreakable branch is still just a stick. He can't necessarily clone objects midway the battle.

So, is it possible? Technically, he manages to defeat the dragon version of Ganon. But the software forces the user to wield the legendary weapon as the last strike, so technically, it's not fully a stick-only run. But what fun is that?

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