Streaming Star Spends 37 Straight Trying to Beat <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a Single Branch

One could think that two years post-launch since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, fans would have exhausted creative challenge runs that impose special restrictions on a gameplay session. However, although numerous gamers have attempted to finish Tears of the Kingdom with just a wooden stick, streamer PointCrow stands out as the individual who endeavored to clear the adventure with a one stick—specifically, the very same stick throughout.

The streamer is renowned for these kinds of difficult playthroughs, like the time he went through the game solely with bombs or the effort where he tried to defeat the story with no stamina. A one-branch playthrough, however, sounds impossible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which requires the hero to use the Master Sword. Then, there's the whole durability mechanic, which is particularly relevant when working with the weakest weapon in the entire game. But if the stick shatters, that's it. Game over.

So, How?

How did he do it? The simple explanation is exploits. The complete answer, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have separate game sessions that impact 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 prologue and initial tutorial island, and this character acquires full stamina and hearts. From this point, he triggers a cinematic and pauses partway through to tell the game to load an automatic save from the stick file. The system gets mixed up and generates a new game file that combines the conditions of the original two.

This causes new problems, though. The merged save file has a Link that never obtain the capability to enter shrines. Luckily, this is an issue that the file exploit fixes easily, but pulling it off means depending on an buggy build of the title that fails to open some locations. Like everything else, he has a clever solution for it: He starts the game on its early version 1.0, and then updates the game partway through to make sure it begins functioning correctly.

Bypassing Durability and Other Challenges

Interestingly, the prologue version of Link is programmed so that he cannot damage any tools he wields, likely to avoid a situation where the user gets stuck at the start of the adventure. But that's additionally how PointCrow gets around the wear issue, as the character he pulls across dimensions is the version from the start of the game. It's a clever trick, but not a method that eliminates all potential difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a ineffective item that makes encounters tedious. But at that point, it's all a question of determination and perseverance. It also aids that there's a duplication glitch that gives him an abundant number of items to boost his attack, or accumulate on revival fairies. He additionally makes use of a glitch that enables him to clip through the environment. A few would find these methods grounds to discredit the legitimacy of the attempt, but to my view, he's a resourceful gamer who is willing to do whatever it takes to engage his viewer. He also implements a safeguard of kinds stipulating that, for each fairy he employs, he'll ban a fan from his Twitch chat, creating an incentive to avoid depend too much on them.

Major Battles and the Final Encounter

The streamer succeeds to defeat many of Tears of the Kingdom's main enemies, but the battles appear painful. The YouTube edit of his quest doesn't make the audience endure the entire conflicts, which is a good thing when a few of them take several long hours. A particular enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, requires an incredible twenty-three hours. The Ganondorf showdown, which erases Link's health as it progresses, is a memorable tense moment. The indestructible branch is still just a stick. He is unable to always duplicate items midway the battle.

Did he succeed? Technically, he does overcome the beast form of Ganon. But the software forces the player to use the legendary weapon as the last strike, so strictly speaking, it's not fully a stick-only playthrough. But where's the challenge in that?

When everything is said and done, the streamer banned more than 1,000 users in his live stream. RIP.