Streaming Star Spends Thirty-Seven Straight Attempting to Conquer <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a One Branch

You might assume that after two years since Tears of the Kingdom debuted, enthusiasts would have run out of novel challenge runs that impose special restrictions on a gameplay session. However, although many players have tried to finish the game using just a wooden stick, streamer the streamer holds the record as the player who endeavored to clear the game with a single stick—meaning, the exact same one throughout.

The streamer is famous for these kinds of challenge runs, such as the time he played the game solely with bombs or the effort where he aimed to defeat the game with zero energy. A one-branch run, though, sounds impossible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which requires the hero to wield the legendary blade. Additionally, there's the entire weapon wear system, which is especially important when dealing with the weakest weapon in the entire world. Yet if the branch shatters, that's the end. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

How did he do it? The straightforward answer is glitches. The complete answer, I kid you not, is parallel universes. It turns out, you can manipulate Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have separate playthroughs that impact one another. So the creator does a “setup” save where he advances standardly, and the real file, where he's limited. The setup save has him going through the prologue and initial tutorial island, and this Link gains full stamina and hearts. From this point, he starts a cutscene and halts midway through to tell the game to load an auto-save from the branch-only file. The system gets confused and creates a third save file that merges the states of the first two files.

That causes new issues, though. The merged save file has a Link that did not obtain the capability to enter shrines. Luckily, this is something that the save glitch fixes easily, but pulling it off means depending on an unstable version of the game that refuses to open certain areas. Like everything else, he has a technical workaround for it: He starts Tears of the Kingdom on its early 1.0 build, and then updates the game midway through to ensure it begins functioning correctly.

Bypassing Durability and Other Hurdles

Interestingly, the introductory version of the hero is programmed so that he is unable to break any tools he uses, presumably to prevent a situation where the user gets stuck at the start of the game. But that's also how PointCrow gets around the wear issue, as the Link he pulls across dimensions is the one from the start of the game. It's a smart technique, but not a method that eradicates all possible difficulty. The stick is still a weak weapon that renders encounters onerous. But at that point, it's entirely a matter of grit and perseverance. It also aids that there's a duplication glitch that gives him an plentiful number of items to improve his attack, or stock up on revival fairies. He additionally employs a glitch that allows him to clip through the environment. Some would consider these methods grounds to question the legitimacy of the run, but to my view, he's a inventive gamer who is willing to do anything necessary to entertain his viewer. He further implements a penalty of sorts stating that, for each fairy he uses, he'll ban one fan from his live stream, creating an incentive to avoid depend too much on them.

Boss Fights and the Final Showdown

The streamer manages to defeat many of the game's bosses, but the battles appear grueling. The video version of his quest spares the audience endure the whole conflicts, which is a good thing when a few of them last several hours. One boss fight, a powerful foe, takes an astonishing 23 hours. The final villain showdown, which erases Link's hearts as it progresses, is a memorable tense moment. The indestructible branch is still just a piece of wood. He can't always clone items midway the fight.

Did he succeed? In a matter of speaking, PointCrow manages to defeat the beast form of the antagonist. But the software compels the player to use the Master Sword as the last strike, so strictly speaking, it's not fully a stick-only run. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, PointCrow banned over 1,000 users in his live stream. Rest in peace.