Streaming Star Spends Thirty-Seven Hours Trying to Conquer <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a Single Branch

You might assume that two years post-launch since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have run out of novel challenge runs that apply special rules on a playthrough. However, although many gamers have attempted to finish Tears of the Kingdom with just a wooden stick, streamer the streamer stands out as the individual who aimed to beat the game with a one stick—meaning, the exact same stick throughout.

PointCrow is renowned for these kinds of challenge runs, like the time he went through the game using only bombs or the effort where he tried to beat the story with zero energy. A one-branch playthrough, though, sounds unfeasible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which requires the hero to use the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the whole durability system, which is especially relevant when dealing with the most fragile tool in the entire world. Yet if the stick shatters, that's it. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

How did he do it? The straightforward explanation is glitches. The full story, believe it or not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can manipulate Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have separate playthroughs that impact one another. So the creator creates a “preparation” file where he progresses normally, and the real save, where he's restricted. The preparatory save has him completing the intro and first tutorial island, and this Link acquires maximum stamina and health. From this point, he triggers a cinematic and pauses midway through to tell the software to load an automatic save from the stick file. The game gets confused and generates a new game file that combines the conditions of the first two files.

This causes new issues, though. The merged file has a protagonist that did not obtain the capability to access sacred places. Luckily, this is something that the save glitch addresses readily, but pulling it off means depending on an unstable build of the title that refuses to load certain areas. As with everything else, he has a technical solution for it: He starts Tears of the Kingdom on its pre-release 1.0 build, and then updates the software partway through to make sure it begins functioning correctly.

Bypassing Durability and Additional Challenges

Interestingly, the introductory version of the hero is programmed so that he is unable to break any tools he uses, likely to prevent a situation where the player gets stuck at the start of the adventure. But that's additionally how PointCrow bypasses the durability issue, as the character he transfers across universes is the one from the start of the story. It's a clever technique, but not one that eradicates all possible difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a ineffective item that makes battles tedious. But at that point, it's entirely a question of determination and perseverance. It further aids that there's a copying exploit that gives him an plentiful number of consumables to improve his strength, or accumulate on revival fairies. He also employs a bug that allows Link to clip through the environment. A few would consider these means reason to discredit the legitimacy of the run, but in my mind, he's a inventive player who is ready to do anything necessary to engage his audience. He further implements a penalty of sorts stating that, for every spirit he uses, he'll remove a fan from his Twitch chat, creating an incentive to not overly rely on them.

Boss Fights and the Last Showdown

The streamer manages to defeat many of the game's bosses, but the battles look painful. The video version of his journey spares the viewer endure the whole conflicts, which is a good thing when some of them last several long hours. A particular enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, requires an incredible 23 hours. The Ganondorf battle, which depletes the hero's hearts as it progresses, is a notable tense moment. The unbreakable branch is still just a piece of wood. He is unable to always clone items during the battle.

So, is it possible? Technically, he manages to defeat the dragon version of Ganon. But the game forces the user to use the Master Sword as the final strike, so technically, it's not quite completely a branch-exclusive playthrough. But what fun is that?

In the end, PointCrow removed over 1,000 users in his Twitch chat. Rest in peace.