Streaming Star Dedicates Thirty-Seven Straight Trying to Beat <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a One Branch

You might assume that after two years since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have run out of creative self-imposed challenges that impose unique restrictions on a playthrough. However, while numerous gamers have tried to complete the game with just a stick, content creator PointCrow stands out as the player who aimed to clear the game with a single branch—specifically, the exact same one throughout.

The streamer is renowned for these kinds of difficult playthroughs, like the time he went through the game solely with explosives or the effort where he tried to beat the story with no energy. A single stick playthrough, though, seems unfeasible at first glance. There's the game's introduction, which forces the hero to wield the legendary blade. Additionally, there's the whole durability mechanic, which is especially relevant when working with the weakest tool in the entire world. Yet if the stick shatters, that's the end. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

So, how? The straightforward explanation is exploits. The full answer, believe it or not, is parallel universes. Apparently, you can tweak the game's save file system to have distinct game sessions that affect one another. So the creator creates a “setup” file where he progresses standardly, and the actual save, where he's limited. The setup save has him going through the intro and initial tutorial island, and this character gains maximum endurance and hearts. From this point, he triggers a cinematic and pauses partway through to tell the software to load an automatic save from the stick file. The system gets mixed up and creates a third save file that merges the conditions of the first two files.

That causes fresh issues, though. The fused file has a Link that never acquired the capability to access sacred places. Luckily, this is an issue that the file exploit fixes readily, but executing it means depending on an unstable build of the game that refuses to load certain locations. As with 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 software midway through to make sure it starts functioning correctly.

Overcoming Weapon Wear and Other Challenges

Curiously, the prologue version of Link is programmed so that he cannot damage any weapons he wields, presumably to avoid a situation where the user gets trapped at the start of the game. But that's also how PointCrow gets around the durability problem, as the Link he pulls between universes is the one from the start of the game. It's a clever trick, but not one that eliminates all possible friction. The stick is still a ineffective item that makes battles onerous. But at that point, it's all a matter of grit and dedication. It also helps that there's a duplication glitch that grants him an plentiful number of consumables to boost his strength, or accumulate on healing spirits. He additionally employs a bug that enables him to clip through the environment. A few would find these means reason to discredit the legitimacy of the run, but in my mind, he's a inventive gamer who is ready to do whatever it takes to entertain his audience. He further uses a penalty of sorts stating that, for every spirit he employs, he'll remove one fan from his live stream, establishing an motivation to avoid depend too much on them.

Boss Fights and the Final Showdown

The streamer manages to get through many of the game's main enemies, but the fights appear painful. The YouTube version of his quest spares the viewer endure the entire fights, which is a good thing when some of them take multiple hours. One enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an astonishing 23 hours. The Ganondorf showdown, which erases Link's health as it progresses, is a memorable nail-biter. The indestructible branch is still only a piece of wood. He is unable to necessarily duplicate objects midway the battle.

So, is it possible? In a matter of speaking, PointCrow manages to defeat the beast form of the antagonist. But the game forces the user to use the legendary weapon as the last strike, so technically, it's not quite completely a branch-exclusive run. But what fun is that?

When everything is said and done, PointCrow banned over a thousand users in his live stream. RIP.