Twitch Personality Spends 37 Straight Trying to Beat <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a Single Stick

You might assume that two years post-launch since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom debuted, enthusiasts would have run out of novel self-imposed challenges that impose unique restrictions on a playthrough. However, although many players have attempted to complete Tears of the Kingdom with only a stick, content creator PointCrow holds the record as the individual who endeavored to beat the game with a single stick—specifically, the exact same stick throughout.

The streamer is famous for such challenge runs, such as the instance he went through the title using only explosives or the effort where he aimed to beat the game with zero energy. A one-branch run, however, seems unfeasible at face value. There's the opening sequence, which requires Link to wield the legendary blade. Additionally, there's the entire weapon wear system, which is especially important when dealing with the weakest tool in the entire game. But if the branch shatters, that's it. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

So, how? The straightforward explanation is exploits. The full answer, believe it or not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have separate game sessions that affect one another. So the creator creates a “preparation” save where he advances normally, and the actual save, where he's restricted. The preparatory save has him completing the intro and first starting area, and this character acquires maximum endurance and hearts. From this point, he triggers a cutscene and pauses midway through to instruct the software to open an automatic save from the branch-only file. The system gets confused and creates a third save file that merges the conditions of the first two files.

That creates new issues, though. The fused file has a Link that never obtain the ability to access shrines. Fortunately, this is an issue that the file exploit fixes readily, but pulling it off means relying on an buggy version of the game that refuses to open some locations. Like other obstacles, he has a clever solution for it: He begins the game on its pre-release version 1.0, and then patches the game partway through to make sure it starts functioning correctly.

Overcoming Durability and Additional Challenges

Curiously, the prologue form of the hero is programmed so that he cannot break any weapons he uses, presumably to prevent a scenario where the player gets trapped at the start of the adventure. But that's additionally how PointCrow gets around the wear problem, as the Link he transfers between dimensions is the one from the beginning of the story. It's a clever trick, but not one that eradicates all possible difficulty. The stick is nonetheless a ineffective item that renders battles onerous. But at that point, it's all a question of grit and dedication. It also helps that there's a copying exploit that grants him an plentiful supply of items to boost his attack, or stock up on revival fairies. He additionally employs a glitch that allows him to clip through the world. Some would consider these means grounds to question the validity of the attempt, but in my mind, he's a inventive player who is willing to do anything necessary to entertain his audience. He further implements a safeguard of sorts stipulating that, for each fairy he employs, he'll remove one fan from his Twitch chat, creating an motivation to avoid depend too much on them.

Major Battles and the Last Encounter

The streamer manages to defeat many of the game's main enemies, but the fights look grueling. The YouTube edit of his journey doesn't make the audience endure the whole conflicts, which is a blessing when a few of them take multiple hours. One enemy encounter, a powerful foe, takes an incredible 23 hours. The Ganondorf showdown, which depletes the hero's hearts as it progresses, is a notable nail-biter. The unbreakable stick is still just a stick. He can't always clone objects during the battle.

Did he succeed? Technically, PointCrow manages to overcome the beast form of the antagonist. But the software forces the player to use the legendary weapon as the last strike, so technically, it's not completely a stick-only run. But what fun is that?

When everything is said and done, the streamer banned more than a thousand users in his Twitch chat. Rest in peace.