Streaming Personality Dedicates Thirty-Seven Straight Attempting to Beat <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a One Stick

One could think that after two years since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have run out of creative challenge runs that apply unique rules on a gameplay session. Yet, while many gamers have attempted to finish Tears of the Kingdom with just a wooden stick, streamer PointCrow holds the record as the individual who aimed to clear the game with a single stick—meaning, the exact same one from start to finish.

The streamer is renowned for these kinds of challenge runs, like the instance he went through the title solely with explosives or the effort where he aimed to defeat the game with no energy. A one-branch playthrough, however, sounds impossible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which forces the hero to use the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the entire durability mechanic, which is particularly important when working with the weakest tool in the whole world. But if the stick breaks, that's the end. Game over.

So, How?

How did he do it? The straightforward answer is exploits. The complete story, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can manipulate the game's saving mechanism to have separate playthroughs that impact one another. So PointCrow creates a “setup” file where he advances standardly, and the real save, where he's limited. The preparatory file has him completing the prologue and first starting area, and this Link acquires full endurance and hearts. From here, he starts a cutscene and halts partway through to instruct the software to open an auto-save from the stick file. The game gets mixed up and creates a new game file that merges the states of the original two.

This creates fresh issues, however. The merged save file has a protagonist that never obtain the ability to access sacred places. Luckily, this is an issue that the save glitch addresses easily, but executing it means depending on an unstable version of the game that fails to open certain areas. Like everything else, he has a clever workaround for it: He begins the game on its pre-release version 1.0, and then updates the game midway through to ensure it begins working properly.

Overcoming Weapon Wear and Other Hurdles

Interestingly, the prologue form of Link is coded so that he cannot damage any tools he uses, presumably to prevent a situation where the player gets stuck at the start of the game. But that's also how PointCrow bypasses the durability issue, as the Link he pulls between universes is the version from the beginning of the story. It's a smart trick, but not a method that eliminates all potential difficulty. The branch is still a weak item that makes battles tedious. But at that stage, it's entirely a matter of determination and perseverance. It also helps that there's a duplication glitch that grants him an abundant supply of items to improve his strength, or accumulate on revival fairies. He also employs a glitch that enables him to clip through the environment. Some would consider these means reason to question the validity of the attempt, but to my view, he's a resourceful gamer who is willing to do anything necessary to entertain his viewer. He also implements a safeguard of sorts stating that, for each spirit he uses, he'll ban one fan from his live stream, creating an motivation to not overly rely on them.

Major Battles and the Final Encounter

The streamer succeeds to defeat many of Tears of the Kingdom's bosses, but the fights look painful. The YouTube edit of his journey doesn't make the viewer endure the whole fights, which is a blessing when some of them last several hours. A particular enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, takes an incredible twenty-three hours. The Ganondorf battle, which erases Link's health as it progresses, is a notable nail-biter. The unbreakable stick is still only a stick. He can't necessarily duplicate items during the fight.

So, is it possible? Technically, he manages to overcome the dragon version of the antagonist. But the software compels the player to use the legendary weapon as the final strike, so strictly speaking, it's not quite completely a stick-only run. But where's the challenge in that?

When everything is said and done, PointCrow banned over 1,000 people in his Twitch chat. RIP.