Twitch Personality Spends 37 Straight Trying to Beat <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a Single Stick

One could think that two years post-launch since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom arrived, enthusiasts would have exhausted creative self-imposed challenges that impose special restrictions on a playthrough. Yet, although many players have tried to complete the game using just a wooden stick, content creator the streamer holds the record as the player who endeavored to beat the adventure with a one stick—specifically, the exact same stick from start to finish.

The streamer is famous for these kinds of difficult playthroughs, such as the instance he went through the game solely with explosives or the attempt 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 forces Link to wield the legendary blade. Additionally, there's the whole weapon wear mechanic, which is especially relevant when dealing with the most fragile weapon in the whole world. But if the stick breaks, that's it. Game over.

So, How?

How did he do it? The simple explanation is glitches. The complete story, believe it or not, is alternate dimensions. It turns out, you can tweak the game's saving mechanism to have distinct game sessions that impact one another. So PointCrow does a “preparation” file where he advances normally, and the real save, where he's limited. The setup save has him completing the prologue and initial tutorial island, and this Link acquires full stamina and health. From this point, he starts a cinematic and pauses midway through to instruct the software to open an auto-save from the stick file. The game gets mixed up and generates a third save file that combines the conditions of the original two.

That causes new problems, however. The merged file has a Link that never acquired the ability to access shrines. Luckily, this is an issue that the save glitch addresses easily, but pulling it off means depending on an buggy version of the title that fails to load certain areas. As with other obstacles, he has a clever workaround for it: He begins Tears of the Kingdom on its early 1.0 build, and then updates the software partway through to ensure it begins working properly.

Overcoming Durability and Additional Hurdles

Interestingly, the introductory form of Link is programmed so that he cannot damage any tools he wields, presumably to avoid a scenario where the user gets stuck at the beginning of the adventure. But that's additionally how the streamer bypasses the durability issue, as the Link he pulls across universes is the one from the start of the story. It's a clever technique, but not a method that eradicates all possible friction. The stick is nonetheless a ineffective item that makes battles onerous. But at that stage, it's all a matter of grit and perseverance. It further helps that there's a duplication glitch that gives him an abundant number of items to boost his strength, or accumulate on healing spirits. He also employs a bug that enables Link to phase through the environment. Some would consider these methods reason to discredit the legitimacy of the attempt, but to my view, he's a inventive gamer who is ready to do anything necessary to engage his viewer. He also uses a penalty of kinds stating that, for each spirit he uses, he'll remove a viewer from his live stream, establishing an motivation to not depend too much on them.

Boss Fights and the Final Showdown

The streamer manages to defeat several of the game's main enemies, but the fights appear painful. The video edit of his quest spares the audience sit through the whole fights, which is a blessing when some of them take several long hours. A particular boss fight, a powerful foe, requires an astonishing twenty-three straight. The Ganondorf battle, which depletes Link's health as it unfolds, is a notable nail-biter. The indestructible branch is after all only a stick. He is unable to always clone objects during the battle.

So, is it possible? Technically, PointCrow manages to defeat the beast form of the antagonist. But the software compels the user to use the legendary weapon as the last attack, so strictly speaking, it's not fully a branch-exclusive run. But where's the challenge in that?

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