Twitch Star Dedicates Thirty-Seven Straight Trying to Conquer <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a Single Branch

You might assume that after two years since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom arrived, fans would have exhausted creative self-imposed challenges that impose unique restrictions on a playthrough. However, while numerous gamers have attempted to finish the game with just a stick, streamer the streamer holds the record as the player who aimed to clear the game with a single stick—specifically, the exact same stick throughout.

PointCrow is famous for these kinds of challenge runs, such as the instance he played the title using only bombs or the attempt where he tried to beat the story with zero stamina. A one-branch run, though, sounds impossible at face value. There's the game's introduction, which forces the hero to wield the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the whole weapon wear system, which is especially important when working with the weakest weapon in the whole world. Yet if the stick breaks, that's it. It's over.

The Method Behind the Madness

How did he do it? The simple answer is exploits. The complete answer, 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 does a “setup” file where he advances standardly, and the actual save, where he's restricted. The setup file has him going through the prologue and initial starting area, and this Link gains full stamina and health. From here, he triggers a cutscene and halts partway through to tell the game to load an auto-save from the branch-only file. The game gets mixed up and creates a third save file that combines the conditions of the first two files.

This creates new problems, however. The fused file has a Link that did not acquired the ability to enter shrines. Luckily, this is something that the save glitch fixes readily, but executing it means depending on an unstable build of the game that fails to load certain areas. Like everything else, he has a technical workaround for it: He starts the game on its pre-release version 1.0, and then patches the game partway through to ensure it starts working properly.

Bypassing Durability and Other Challenges

Curiously, the prologue version of the hero is programmed so that he cannot damage any tools he wields, likely to prevent a situation where the player gets stuck at the start of the adventure. But that's also how the streamer gets around the durability issue, as the character he pulls across dimensions is the one from the start of the story. It's a smart technique, but not a method that eliminates all possible difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a weak weapon that renders encounters onerous. But at that point, it's all a question of determination and perseverance. It also helps that there's a duplication glitch that grants him an plentiful number of items to boost his attack, or stock up on revival fairies. He additionally makes use of a glitch that enables Link to clip through the world. A few would find these methods grounds to question the legitimacy of the run, but to my view, he's a resourceful player who is ready to do whatever it takes to engage his viewer. He further implements a penalty of kinds stating that, for every spirit he employs, he'll ban one viewer from his live stream, establishing an motivation to not overly rely on them.

Major Battles and the Final Encounter

PointCrow manages to get through several of the game's bosses, but the battles look grueling. The YouTube version of his quest spares the viewer endure the entire conflicts, which is a good thing when some of them last several long hours. A particular boss fight, Queen Gibdo, requires an incredible 23 hours. The Ganondorf battle, which depletes Link's hearts as it unfolds, is a notable nail-biter. The unbreakable branch is still only a stick. He can't always clone items midway the battle.

So, is it possible? Technically, PointCrow does defeat the beast form of Ganon. But the software compels the user to use the legendary weapon as the final strike, so strictly speaking, it's not quite fully a branch-exclusive playthrough. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, PointCrow banned more than a thousand people in his Twitch chat. RIP.