Twitch Personality Spends Thirty-Seven Hours Trying to Beat <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a Single Branch

You might assume that two years post-launch since Tears of the Kingdom debuted, fans would have exhausted creative self-imposed challenges that apply unique restrictions on a playthrough. However, while numerous players have attempted to finish the game with just a stick, streamer the streamer holds the record as the player who aimed to clear the adventure with a single stick—specifically, the very same one from start to finish.

PointCrow is famous for these kinds of difficult playthroughs, like the time he played the game solely with bombs or the effort where he tried to beat the game with no stamina. A single stick playthrough, however, sounds unfeasible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which forces the hero to use the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the whole durability mechanic, which is especially important when working with the most fragile weapon in the entire game. Yet if the branch shatters, that's it. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

How did he do it? The straightforward explanation is exploits. The complete story, I kid you not, is parallel universes. Apparently, you can tweak the game's saving mechanism to have distinct playthroughs that affect one another. So the creator creates a “setup” file where he advances normally, and the actual file, where he's limited. The preparatory file has him completing the prologue and first tutorial island, and this Link acquires full endurance and hearts. From this point, he starts a cinematic and halts midway through to instruct the software to load an auto-save from the stick file. The game gets mixed up and creates a third save file that combines the conditions of the original two.

This creates fresh problems, however. The fused save file has a protagonist that did not obtain the capability to access shrines. Luckily, this is an issue that the file exploit addresses readily, but executing it means relying on an buggy build of the game that fails to open some areas. As with other obstacles, he has a technical solution for it: He starts the game on its pre-release 1.0 build, and then patches the game partway through to ensure it begins functioning correctly.

Bypassing Weapon Wear and Additional Hurdles

Curiously, the introductory version of the hero is coded so that he cannot break any weapons he wields, presumably to prevent a scenario where the user gets trapped at the start of the adventure. But that's also how PointCrow bypasses the durability issue, as the Link he transfers across universes is the one from the beginning of the story. It's a smart technique, but not one that eliminates all possible friction. The branch is nonetheless a ineffective weapon that renders encounters onerous. But at that point, it's entirely a question of determination and dedication. It also helps that there's a duplication glitch that grants him an abundant number of consumables to boost his attack, or accumulate on revival fairies. He also employs a bug that allows him to clip through the environment. Some would consider these methods grounds to discredit the validity of the run, but in my mind, he's a resourceful gamer who is willing to do anything necessary to entertain his audience. He further implements a penalty of sorts stipulating that, for every spirit he employs, he'll remove one fan from his Twitch chat, establishing an motivation to avoid depend too much on them.

Major Battles and the Final Showdown

PointCrow succeeds to get through many of Tears of the Kingdom's main enemies, but the fights appear grueling. The YouTube version of his quest spares the audience sit through the entire conflicts, which is a blessing when a few of them take several long hours. A particular enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an astonishing twenty-three hours. The final villain battle, which depletes Link's health as it progresses, is a notable nail-biter. The unbreakable stick is still only a piece of wood. He is unable to necessarily clone items midway the battle.

Did he succeed? In a matter of speaking, he does overcome the dragon version of Ganon. But the game compels the user to use the Master Sword as the last strike, so strictly speaking, it's not quite fully a branch-exclusive playthrough. But what fun is that?

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