Twitch Star Spends 37 Hours Trying to Conquer <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a One Stick

One could think that two years post-launch since Tears of the Kingdom debuted, fans would have run out of novel challenge runs that impose special restrictions on a playthrough. Yet, although numerous gamers have attempted to complete Tears of the Kingdom with only a stick, content creator the streamer stands out as the individual who aimed to clear the adventure with a single stick—meaning, the exact same one from start to finish.

PointCrow is renowned for these kinds of challenge runs, such as the instance he played the title using only bombs or the effort where he tried to defeat the story with zero energy. A single stick playthrough, however, sounds unfeasible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which forces the hero to wield the legendary blade. Additionally, there's the entire durability system, which is especially important when working with the most fragile weapon in the whole game. But if the branch shatters, that's the end. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

So, how? The straightforward answer is exploits. The complete answer, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. It turns out, you can tweak Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have separate game sessions that affect one another. So PointCrow creates a “preparation” file where he progresses normally, and the actual file, where he's limited. The setup file has him completing the intro and initial starting area, and this character gains maximum endurance and hearts. From here, he starts a cutscene and pauses partway through to instruct the software to open an auto-save from the stick file. The game gets confused and creates a third save file that combines the conditions of the first two files.

That causes fresh issues, though. The fused save file has a Link that did not acquired the ability to enter sacred places. Luckily, this is something that the save glitch fixes readily, but executing it means depending on an unstable version of the title that fails to load some locations. Like other obstacles, he has a clever workaround for it: He starts Tears of the Kingdom on its pre-release 1.0 build, and then patches the game partway through to make sure it begins working properly.

Overcoming Weapon Wear and Additional Challenges

Interestingly, the introductory form of the hero is programmed so that he is unable to break any tools he uses, presumably to avoid a situation where the player gets trapped at the start of the game. But that's additionally how the streamer gets around the durability issue, as the Link he transfers between dimensions is the version from the start of the game. It's a smart technique, but not a method that eliminates all potential friction. The branch is still a weak weapon that renders encounters onerous. But at that point, it's all a matter of grit and dedication. It also helps that there's a copying exploit that grants him an plentiful supply of consumables to improve his attack, or stock up on revival fairies. He additionally employs a bug that enables Link to phase through the world. A few would find these means reason to question the legitimacy of the attempt, but to my view, he's a inventive gamer who is willing to do anything necessary to engage his audience. He also uses a safeguard of sorts stating that, for each spirit he uses, he'll ban a viewer from his Twitch chat, creating an incentive to avoid depend too much on them.

Major Battles and the Last Showdown

PointCrow manages to defeat several of the game's main enemies, but the fights look painful. The YouTube version of his quest spares the audience sit through the entire fights, which is a blessing when some of them take several long hours. One boss fight, Queen Gibdo, takes an incredible 23 straight. The Ganondorf battle, which depletes Link's health as it unfolds, is a notable nail-biter. The unbreakable stick is after all just a stick. He is unable to necessarily duplicate items during the battle.

Did he succeed? In a matter of speaking, he manages to overcome the dragon version of the antagonist. But the game compels the user to use the Master Sword as the final strike, so technically, it's not completely a stick-only playthrough. But what fun is that?

In the end, PointCrow removed more than a thousand users in his live stream. Rest in peace.