Twitch Star Dedicates 37 Straight Trying to Beat <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a Single Branch

One could think that two years post-launch since Tears of the Kingdom debuted, enthusiasts would have exhausted creative self-imposed challenges that impose special rules on a gameplay session. However, while many gamers have attempted to complete Tears of the Kingdom using only a stick, streamer PointCrow stands out as the player who endeavored to clear the game with a single branch—meaning, the very same one from start to finish.

The streamer is renowned for such challenge runs, such as the time he went through the title using only explosives or the attempt where he tried to defeat the story with no energy. A single stick playthrough, though, seems impossible at face value. There's the opening sequence, which requires the hero to use the Master Sword. Then, there's the entire weapon wear system, which is particularly relevant when dealing with the weakest weapon in the entire game. Yet if the stick breaks, that's the end. It's over.

So, How?

So, how? The simple answer is glitches. The full story, I kid you not, is parallel universes. It turns out, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's save file system to have distinct game sessions that affect one another. So the creator does a “preparation” file where he advances standardly, and the real file, where he's restricted. The setup file has him going through the intro and initial tutorial island, and this Link gains full endurance and hearts. From this point, he triggers a cutscene and pauses partway through to instruct the software to load an automatic save from the stick file. The game gets confused and generates a third game file that combines the states of the first two files.

That creates fresh issues, though. The fused file has a Link that did not obtain the capability to access sacred places. Fortunately, this is something that the file exploit fixes readily, but executing it means depending on an buggy version of the title that fails to open certain areas. As with everything else, he has a clever workaround for it: He starts the game on its early 1.0 build, and then updates the software partway through to make sure it begins working properly.

Bypassing Weapon Wear and Other Hurdles

Curiously, the prologue form of Link is coded so that he is unable to break any tools he uses, presumably to avoid a situation where the user gets trapped at the beginning of the game. But that's also how PointCrow gets around the durability problem, as the character he transfers between dimensions is the one from the start of the game. It's a smart technique, but not one that eliminates all possible difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a weak item that makes encounters onerous. But at that stage, it's all a question of grit and perseverance. It also aids that there's a copying exploit that grants him an abundant supply of consumables to improve his attack, or stock up on healing spirits. He also employs a bug that enables him to clip through the environment. A few would consider these methods reason to question the validity of the run, but to my view, he's a resourceful player who is willing to do anything necessary to entertain his audience. He further uses a penalty of kinds stating that, for each fairy he uses, he'll ban a viewer from his live stream, establishing an motivation to not depend too much on them.

Boss Fights and the Last Showdown

The streamer succeeds to defeat many of Tears of the Kingdom's main enemies, but the fights look painful. The video version of his quest spares the audience sit through the whole fights, which is a good thing when some of them take multiple long hours. A particular boss fight, a powerful foe, takes an incredible 23 straight. The final villain battle, which erases Link's health as it progresses, is a memorable tense moment. The unbreakable branch is after all only a piece of wood. He can't always duplicate objects during the battle.

So, is it possible? Technically, he does defeat the dragon version of Ganon. But the game compels the user to wield the Master Sword as the final strike, so strictly speaking, it's not completely a branch-exclusive run. But what fun is that?

When everything is said and done, the streamer removed more than 1,000 people in his live stream. RIP.