Streaming Personality Dedicates 37 Hours Attempting to Conquer <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a One Stick

One could think that two years post-launch since Tears of the Kingdom debuted, fans would have exhausted creative challenge runs that apply special rules on a playthrough. Yet, although many gamers have tried to complete the game using just a stick, streamer PointCrow stands out as the individual who endeavored to beat the game with a single stick—specifically, the exact same one from start to finish.

The streamer is famous for such difficult playthroughs, such as the instance he went through the game using only explosives or the attempt where he aimed to defeat the game with zero energy. A one-branch playthrough, though, sounds unfeasible at face value. There's the opening sequence, which forces the hero to use the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the whole weapon wear system, which is especially relevant when working with the most fragile weapon in the whole game. Yet if the branch breaks, that's the end. It's over.

The Method Behind the Madness

So, how? The simple explanation is glitches. The complete story, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. It turns out, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have separate game sessions that impact one another. So PointCrow does a “setup” save where he progresses standardly, and the actual save, where he's limited. The setup file has him completing the prologue and initial tutorial island, and this Link acquires maximum endurance and health. From this point, he triggers a cutscene and halts midway through to instruct the software to load an automatic save from the stick file. The game gets mixed up and generates a new game file that merges the states of the original two.

That creates new problems, though. The merged save file has a protagonist that did not obtain the capability to enter sacred places. Fortunately, this is an issue that the save glitch addresses easily, but executing it means relying on an unstable version of the title that refuses to open certain areas. As with other obstacles, he has a clever solution for it: He starts Tears of the Kingdom on its pre-release version 1.0, and then updates the software midway through to ensure it begins working properly.

Overcoming Durability and Other Challenges

Curiously, the prologue version of Link is coded so that he cannot break any tools he uses, presumably to prevent a situation where the user gets stuck at the beginning of the game. But that's additionally how the streamer bypasses the wear problem, as the character he pulls between dimensions is the one from the start of the game. It's a clever technique, but not one that eradicates all possible friction. The branch is nonetheless a weak weapon that makes encounters tedious. But at that point, it's entirely a question of determination and perseverance. It further aids that there's a duplication glitch that gives him an abundant number of consumables to boost his strength, or accumulate on revival fairies. He also makes use of a bug that allows Link to phase through the world. A few would find these methods reason to discredit the validity of the run, but in my mind, he's a resourceful gamer who is willing to do whatever it takes to entertain his audience. He further uses a penalty of sorts stating that, for every fairy he employs, he'll remove a fan from his Twitch chat, creating an motivation to not overly rely on them.

Major Battles and the Last Encounter

The streamer manages to get through many of the game's main enemies, but the fights appear grueling. The YouTube version of his quest doesn't make the audience sit through the entire conflicts, which is a blessing when a few of them last several long hours. One enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an astonishing 23 hours. The final villain battle, which depletes the hero's hearts as it unfolds, is a memorable nail-biter. The unbreakable branch is still only a piece of wood. He is unable to always clone items during the fight.

Did he succeed? In a matter of speaking, he manages to overcome the dragon version of the antagonist. But the software forces the user to use the legendary weapon as the last attack, so technically, it's not completely a branch-exclusive playthrough. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, PointCrow banned over a thousand users in his Twitch chat. Rest in peace.