Twitch Personality Spends 37 Hours Attempting to Conquer <em>The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a One Branch

You might assume that after two years since Tears of the Kingdom debuted, fans would have exhausted creative self-imposed challenges that impose unique restrictions on a gameplay session. However, although many players have attempted to complete the game with only a wooden stick, content creator PointCrow stands out as the player who endeavored to beat the adventure with a one branch—specifically, the very same stick from start to finish.

The streamer is renowned for such difficult playthroughs, such as the instance he went through the game using only bombs or the attempt where he tried to beat the game with zero stamina. A one-branch playthrough, however, sounds impossible at first glance. There's the opening sequence, which forces the hero to use the legendary blade. Then, there's the whole weapon wear system, which is particularly important when dealing with the weakest tool in the whole world. But if the branch shatters, that's it. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

So, how? The straightforward answer is glitches. The full answer, believe it or not, is parallel universes. It turns out, you can manipulate Tears of the Kingdom's save file system to have distinct playthroughs that affect one another. So PointCrow creates a “setup” save where he advances standardly, and the real save, where he's restricted. The preparatory file has him going through the intro and initial starting area, and this Link acquires full stamina and hearts. From here, he starts a cutscene and halts partway through to tell the software to load an auto-save from the stick file. The game gets confused and creates a new game file that combines the states of the original two.

This creates new issues, though. The fused save file has a Link that never obtain the ability to enter sacred places. Fortunately, this is something that the file exploit fixes easily, but executing it means relying on an buggy build of the game that refuses to load some areas. As with other obstacles, he has a clever solution for it: He begins Tears of the Kingdom on its early version 1.0, and then updates the game midway through to make sure it starts working properly.

Bypassing Durability and Other Hurdles

Interestingly, the prologue form of the hero is coded so that he is unable to 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 PointCrow gets around the durability problem, as the character he transfers between universes is the version from the beginning of the game. It's a clever technique, but not one that eliminates all possible difficulty. The branch is nonetheless a weak item that renders encounters onerous. But at that point, it's entirely a question of grit and perseverance. It also aids that there's a duplication glitch that grants him an plentiful number of consumables to improve his strength, or accumulate on healing spirits. He also makes use of a glitch that enables him to clip through the environment. A few would consider these means reason to question the validity of the run, but to my view, he's a inventive gamer who is willing to do whatever it takes to engage his audience. He also implements a safeguard of sorts stipulating that, for each fairy he uses, he'll ban a fan from his Twitch chat, establishing an motivation to not overly rely on them.

Boss Fights and the Final Showdown

The streamer manages to defeat many of the game's bosses, but the fights look grueling. The YouTube version of his quest doesn't make the audience sit through the whole fights, which is a good thing when a few of them last several hours. One enemy encounter, a powerful foe, takes an incredible twenty-three straight. The final villain battle, which erases the hero's hearts as it unfolds, is a notable tense moment. The indestructible branch is after all just a piece of wood. He is unable to necessarily duplicate items during the fight.

So, is it possible? Technically, PointCrow manages to defeat the dragon version of Ganon. But the software forces the user to wield the Master Sword as the final attack, so strictly speaking, it's not completely a branch-exclusive run. But where's the challenge in that?

In the end, the streamer banned over 1,000 people in his live stream. RIP.