Twitch Star Spends Thirty-Seven Hours Attempting to Conquer <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a One Stick
One could think that two years post-launch since Tears of the Kingdom debuted, enthusiasts would have exhausted novel self-imposed challenges that impose unique restrictions on a gameplay session. Yet, although numerous players have tried to finish Tears of the Kingdom with just a stick, streamer PointCrow holds the record as the player who aimed to beat the game with a single branch—specifically, the very same stick throughout.
The streamer is famous for these kinds of difficult playthroughs, such as the time he played the title using only explosives or the attempt where he aimed to defeat the game with no energy. A single stick playthrough, however, seems unfeasible at face value. There's the game's introduction, which forces Link to wield the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the whole weapon wear mechanic, which is especially relevant when dealing with the most fragile tool in the whole game. Yet if the branch shatters, that's it. Game over.
The Method Behind the Madness
How did he do it? The straightforward explanation is glitches. The complete answer, believe it or not, is alternate dimensions. It turns out, you can manipulate Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have separate playthroughs that impact one another. So PointCrow creates a “preparation” save where he advances normally, and the real file, where he's limited. The setup file has him completing the intro and initial tutorial island, and this character gains full stamina and hearts. From here, he starts a cinematic and pauses midway through to tell the game to open 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 problems, though. The merged file has a Link that never obtain the ability to access sacred places. Luckily, this is something that the file exploit addresses easily, but pulling it off means depending on an unstable build of the title that refuses to open some locations. As with everything else, he has a technical solution for it: He begins Tears of the Kingdom on its early 1.0 build, and then patches the game midway through to make sure it begins working properly.
Overcoming Weapon Wear and Other Hurdles
Interestingly, the introductory form of the hero is programmed so that he is unable to break any tools he uses, presumably to avoid a scenario where the player gets trapped at the beginning of the adventure. But that's additionally how PointCrow bypasses the durability issue, as the character he transfers across universes is the one from the beginning of the story. It's a clever trick, but not one that eradicates all potential difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a weak item that renders battles tedious. But at that stage, it's entirely a question of grit and dedication. It further helps that there's a duplication glitch that gives him an abundant number of consumables to improve his attack, or stock up on healing spirits. He also makes use of a bug that allows Link to clip through the environment. Some would consider these methods grounds to discredit the validity of the run, but to my view, he's a resourceful gamer who is ready to do whatever it takes to entertain his viewer. He also uses a safeguard of kinds stipulating that, for each fairy he employs, he'll ban a fan from his Twitch chat, creating an incentive to avoid depend too much on them.
Major Battles and the Last Encounter
The streamer succeeds to get through many of the game's main enemies, but the fights look grueling. The YouTube edit of his quest doesn't make the audience endure the whole fights, which is a good thing when some of them take several hours. One enemy encounter, Queen Gibdo, requires an astonishing 23 straight. The final villain showdown, which erases Link's health as it unfolds, is a memorable nail-biter. The unbreakable stick is after all only a piece of wood. He can't always clone items midway the fight.
Did he succeed? In a matter of speaking, PointCrow does overcome the beast form of the antagonist. But the game forces the user to use the Master Sword as the final strike, so technically, it's not quite fully a stick-only run. But where's the challenge in that?
When everything is said and done, PointCrow removed over a thousand users in his Twitch chat. RIP.
