Twitch Personality Spends Thirty-Seven Straight Trying to Beat <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a One Branch
One could think 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 special restrictions on a playthrough. Yet, while many players have tried to finish Tears of the Kingdom using only a stick, streamer the streamer holds the record as the individual who aimed to beat the game with a single stick—specifically, the exact same one throughout.
The streamer is famous for these kinds of difficult playthroughs, such as the instance he went through the title using only bombs or the effort where he aimed to beat the game with no energy. A single stick run, though, seems unfeasible at face value. There's the game's introduction, which requires the hero to use the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the entire durability mechanic, which is particularly important when working with the most fragile tool in the entire game. But if the stick breaks, that's the end. Game over.
The Method Behind the Madness
How did he do it? The simple answer is glitches. The complete answer, I kid you not, is parallel universes. It turns out, you can manipulate Tears of the Kingdom's save file system to have distinct playthroughs that impact one another. So PointCrow creates a “setup” save where he progresses standardly, and the actual save, where he's restricted. The setup file has him completing the intro and first starting area, and this Link gains maximum endurance and health. From this point, he starts a cinematic and halts midway through to tell the game to load an automatic save from the branch-only file. The system gets confused and generates a third game file that combines the conditions of the original two.
This causes fresh problems, however. The merged save file has a Link that never obtain the capability to access sacred places. Luckily, this is something that the file exploit addresses readily, but executing it means depending on an unstable version of the title that fails to load 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 patches the software midway through to ensure it begins working properly.
Overcoming Durability and Other Hurdles
Interestingly, the introductory version of the hero is programmed so that he cannot break any weapons he wields, presumably to prevent a situation where the user gets trapped at the start of the adventure. But that's additionally how PointCrow bypasses the wear problem, as the Link he transfers between dimensions is the version from the beginning of the story. It's a clever technique, but not one that eradicates all potential difficulty. The stick is still a weak weapon that renders battles tedious. But at that point, it's all a question of grit and dedication. It further aids that there's a duplication glitch that grants him an abundant number of items to boost his attack, or stock up on revival fairies. He also makes use of a bug that enables him to phase through the world. Some would consider these methods grounds to question the validity of the run, but in my mind, he's a inventive gamer who is ready to do anything necessary to engage his viewer. He also uses a penalty of kinds stipulating that, for every fairy he employs, he'll ban a fan from his Twitch chat, establishing an motivation to avoid depend too much on them.
Major Battles and the Final Encounter
PointCrow manages to defeat several of Tears of the Kingdom's bosses, but the battles appear grueling. The video version of his journey doesn't make the audience sit through the whole conflicts, which is a blessing when a few of them take multiple long hours. One enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an astonishing twenty-three hours. The Ganondorf showdown, which erases Link's hearts as it progresses, is a notable tense moment. The indestructible stick is still only a stick. He can't necessarily clone items midway the fight.
So, is it possible? Technically, he manages to overcome the dragon version of Ganon. But the game compels the player to wield the Master Sword as the final strike, so technically, it's not quite completely a branch-exclusive run. But what fun is that?
When everything is said and done, the streamer removed more than a thousand users in his Twitch chat. RIP.
