Streaming Star Spends 37 Hours Trying to Beat <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a One Stick

One could think that two years post-launch since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have exhausted novel self-imposed challenges that apply unique restrictions on a gameplay session. However, although numerous players have tried to finish Tears of the Kingdom with just a stick, content creator PointCrow stands out as the player who endeavored to clear the adventure with a one branch—meaning, the exact same one throughout.

PointCrow is famous for these kinds of challenge runs, like the instance he went through the title using only bombs or the effort where he tried to beat the story with no energy. A one-branch run, though, seems unfeasible at first glance. There's the game's introduction, which requires the hero to wield the legendary blade. Additionally, there's the whole durability mechanic, which is especially relevant when dealing with the weakest tool in the whole game. Yet if the branch shatters, that's the end. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

So, how? The simple answer is exploits. The complete answer, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's save file system to have separate playthroughs that affect one another. So the creator does a “preparation” save where he advances standardly, and the real save, where he's limited. The preparatory file has him going through the intro and initial tutorial island, and this character gains full endurance and hearts. From here, he starts a cinematic and pauses partway through to instruct the game to open an auto-save from the stick file. The game gets mixed up and generates a new save file that combines the conditions of the original two.

That creates fresh problems, however. The fused file has a protagonist that never obtain the capability to enter shrines. Luckily, this is an issue that the save glitch addresses readily, but executing it means depending on an buggy version of the game that fails to load certain areas. As with everything else, he has a clever workaround for it: He starts the game on its early 1.0 build, and then patches the game partway through to ensure it begins functioning correctly.

Bypassing Weapon Wear and Additional Hurdles

Interestingly, the prologue version of the hero is coded so that he is unable to break any tools he uses, presumably to avoid a scenario where the player gets trapped at the beginning of the adventure. But that's additionally how PointCrow bypasses the durability issue, as the character he transfers between universes is the one from the beginning of the game. It's a clever technique, but not one that eradicates all possible friction. The stick is still a weak weapon that renders battles tedious. But at that point, it's entirely a matter of grit and dedication. It also aids that there's a duplication glitch that grants him an abundant supply of consumables to improve his attack, or stock up on revival fairies. He also employs a glitch that allows him to clip through the environment. A few would consider these methods reason to discredit the legitimacy of the attempt, but in my mind, he's a inventive player who is ready to do whatever it takes to engage his viewer. He further implements a penalty of kinds stating that, for each spirit he uses, he'll remove a fan from his live stream, creating an incentive to avoid depend too much on them.

Boss Fights and the Last Showdown

The streamer manages to get through many of Tears of the Kingdom's bosses, but the battles appear painful. The video version of his journey spares the audience endure the entire fights, which is a good thing when a few of them last several hours. One enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an incredible twenty-three straight. The final villain showdown, which erases the hero's health as it unfolds, is a notable tense moment. The indestructible stick is still only a stick. He can't always duplicate objects midway the fight.

Did he succeed? Technically, PointCrow manages to defeat the dragon version of Ganon. But the software compels the player to wield the Master Sword as the last strike, so technically, it's not fully a stick-only playthrough. But what fun is that?

In the end, PointCrow removed more than a thousand users in his Twitch chat. Rest in peace.