Twitch Star Dedicates Thirty-Seven Straight Trying to Conquer <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a One Stick

One could think that after two years since The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom arrived, fans would have run out of novel challenge runs that impose special restrictions on a gameplay session. However, while numerous players have attempted to finish Tears of the Kingdom using only a wooden stick, streamer the streamer holds the record as the player who aimed to clear the adventure with a single branch—specifically, the very same stick throughout.

The streamer is renowned for these kinds of difficult playthroughs, such as the time he played the game solely with bombs or the attempt where he aimed to beat the game with no stamina. A single stick playthrough, however, seems unfeasible at face value. There's the game's introduction, which requires the hero to wield the legendary blade. Additionally, there's the entire durability system, which is particularly relevant when working with the weakest weapon in the entire world. But if the branch breaks, that's it. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

So, how? The straightforward answer is glitches. The complete answer, I kid you not, is alternate dimensions. Apparently, you can manipulate Tears of the Kingdom's saving mechanism to have distinct game sessions that affect one another. So the creator creates a “setup” file where he progresses normally, and the real file, where he's restricted. The preparatory file has him completing the prologue and first starting area, and this character acquires maximum stamina and hearts. From here, he starts a cutscene and pauses midway through to tell the game to open an automatic save from the branch-only file. The game gets confused and creates a new game file that combines the states of the first two files.

This creates new problems, though. The merged save file has a protagonist that did not obtain the capability to enter sacred places. Luckily, this is an issue that the save glitch addresses readily, but pulling it off means depending on an buggy build of the game that refuses to load certain locations. As with everything else, he has a clever solution for it: He starts Tears of the Kingdom on its pre-release version 1.0, and then patches the game partway through to make sure it begins working properly.

Bypassing Durability and Other Challenges

Interestingly, the introductory version of Link is coded so that he is unable to break any tools he uses, presumably to prevent a scenario where the player gets trapped at the start of the adventure. But that's additionally how PointCrow gets around the durability issue, as the character he transfers between universes is the one from the start of the story. It's a smart trick, but not a method that eliminates all possible friction. The stick is still a weak weapon that renders battles onerous. But at that point, it's entirely a question of grit and perseverance. It also helps that there's a duplication glitch that gives him an plentiful number of consumables to boost his strength, or accumulate on healing spirits. He also employs a glitch that enables Link to phase through the environment. A few would consider these means reason to question the legitimacy of the attempt, but in my mind, he's a inventive gamer who is willing to do whatever it takes to engage his audience. He also uses a safeguard of kinds stipulating that, for each spirit he employs, he'll ban one fan from his Twitch chat, creating an motivation to avoid overly rely on them.

Major Battles and the Final Showdown

The streamer succeeds to get through many of the game's main enemies, but the battles appear grueling. The video version of his quest doesn't make the audience sit through the whole conflicts, which is a good thing when a few of them take multiple hours. One enemy encounter, a powerful foe, takes an incredible 23 straight. The final villain showdown, which erases the hero's hearts as it unfolds, is a notable tense moment. The indestructible stick is after all only a stick. He is unable to necessarily clone objects midway the battle.

Did he succeed? Technically, he manages to overcome the dragon version of Ganon. But the game forces the user to wield the legendary weapon as the last strike, so technically, it's not quite completely a stick-only playthrough. But what fun is that?

When everything is said and done, the streamer banned more than a thousand people in his Twitch chat. RIP.