Twitch Personality Spends Thirty-Seven Straight Trying to Conquer <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a One Stick

You might assume that two years post-launch since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have exhausted creative challenge runs that apply unique restrictions on a playthrough. However, although numerous gamers have tried to complete the game with just a stick, content creator the streamer holds the record as the individual who endeavored to clear the game with a single stick—specifically, the exact same stick throughout.

PointCrow is famous for these kinds of challenge runs, like the time he played the title solely with bombs or the attempt where he tried to defeat the game with zero stamina. A single stick playthrough, however, sounds unfeasible at first glance. There's the game's introduction, which forces Link to use the legendary blade. Then, there's the entire weapon wear system, which is especially relevant when dealing with the most fragile weapon in the entire game. Yet if the stick breaks, that's the end. It's over.

So, How?

How did he do it? The straightforward answer is exploits. The complete answer, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can manipulate the game's saving mechanism to have separate game sessions that affect one another. So the creator does a “setup” file where he progresses standardly, and the actual file, where he's limited. The setup save has him going through the prologue and initial tutorial island, and this character gains full stamina and health. From this point, he triggers a cutscene and pauses partway through to tell the software to open an automatic save from the branch-only file. The game gets mixed up and creates a third save file that combines the states of the original two.

This causes new problems, however. The merged save file has a Link that did not acquired the capability to access sacred places. Fortunately, this is something that the save glitch fixes readily, but executing it means relying on an buggy version of the title that fails to load certain locations. As with other obstacles, he has a clever solution for it: He begins Tears of the Kingdom on its pre-release 1.0 build, and then updates the game midway through to ensure it starts working properly.

Overcoming Durability and Other Hurdles

Curiously, the introductory version of the hero is coded so that he is unable to damage any weapons he uses, presumably to avoid a situation where the player gets trapped at the start of the adventure. But that's additionally how PointCrow bypasses the wear issue, as the Link he transfers between universes is the version from the start of the story. It's a clever technique, but not a method that eliminates all possible difficulty. The branch is still a weak weapon that renders battles tedious. But at that stage, it's all a matter of grit and perseverance. It further helps that there's a copying exploit that gives him an abundant supply of items to boost his strength, or accumulate on revival fairies. He additionally makes use of a glitch that allows Link to clip through the world. A few would consider these methods grounds to discredit the validity of the run, but to my view, he's a resourceful gamer who is ready to do whatever it takes to entertain his audience. He further implements a penalty of sorts stipulating that, for each fairy he uses, he'll remove one fan from his Twitch chat, establishing an motivation to not depend too much on them.

Major Battles and the Last Showdown

PointCrow manages to get through several of the game's main enemies, but the fights appear grueling. The video edit of his journey doesn't make the audience endure the entire conflicts, which is a blessing when a few of them last multiple hours. A particular enemy encounter, a powerful foe, takes an astonishing twenty-three straight. The final villain battle, which depletes the hero's hearts as it unfolds, is a notable nail-biter. The unbreakable stick is still only a piece of wood. He is unable to always duplicate items during the battle.

So, is it possible? Technically, he manages to defeat the dragon version of the antagonist. But the game forces the player to use the Master Sword as the last strike, so technically, it's not fully a branch-exclusive run. But where's the challenge in that?

When everything is said and done, PointCrow removed more than 1,000 people in his Twitch chat. Rest in peace.