Streaming Star Spends 37 Straight Trying to Conquer <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> Using a Single Stick

One could think that after two years since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, fans would have run out of novel self-imposed challenges that apply special rules on a gameplay session. Yet, while numerous gamers have attempted to complete Tears of the Kingdom with just a stick, content creator PointCrow holds the record as the player who aimed to clear the game with a single stick—meaning, the exact same one from start to finish.

The streamer is renowned for such difficult playthroughs, like the time he went through the title solely with explosives or the attempt where he tried to defeat the story with zero energy. A single stick run, however, seems unfeasible at face value. There's the game's introduction, which requires Link to use the Master Sword. Additionally, there's the whole durability system, which is especially relevant when working with the weakest tool in the entire world. But if the stick shatters, that's the end. Game over.

The Method Behind the Madness

How did he do it? The straightforward answer is glitches. The full story, believe it or not, is parallel universes. It turns out, you can tweak the game's saving mechanism to have separate game sessions that impact one another. So the creator creates a “preparation” save where he progresses standardly, and the real save, where he's limited. The preparatory save has him going through the prologue and first tutorial island, and this Link gains maximum stamina and hearts. From here, he starts a cinematic and pauses midway through to instruct the software to load an automatic save from the stick file. The game gets mixed up and generates a new game file that combines the states of the first two files.

That creates new problems, however. The fused file has a protagonist that never acquired the capability to access shrines. Luckily, this is something that the file exploit fixes easily, but executing it means relying on an buggy version of the title that refuses to open some areas. As with everything else, he has a technical workaround for it: He begins Tears of the Kingdom on its pre-release 1.0 build, and then patches the game midway through to make sure it starts working properly.

Bypassing Durability and Additional Challenges

Interestingly, the prologue form of the hero is coded so that he is unable to damage any tools he uses, likely to avoid a scenario where the user gets trapped at the start of the game. But that's additionally how PointCrow gets around the durability problem, as the character he pulls across dimensions is the one from the beginning of the game. It's a clever technique, but not one that eliminates all potential friction. The stick is still a weak item that makes battles onerous. But at that point, it's all a question of determination and dedication. It also aids that there's a copying exploit that gives him an plentiful number of consumables to improve his strength, or stock up on revival fairies. He also employs a bug that enables Link to phase through the world. Some would find these means grounds to question the legitimacy of the attempt, but in my mind, he's a inventive gamer who is ready to do anything necessary to entertain his viewer. He also uses a penalty of kinds stipulating that, for every spirit he employs, he'll ban a viewer from his Twitch chat, creating an incentive to avoid depend too much on them.

Boss Fights and the Last Showdown

PointCrow succeeds to defeat many of Tears of the Kingdom's bosses, but the battles look grueling. The YouTube version of his quest spares the viewer sit through the whole conflicts, which is a blessing when a few of them take several hours. A particular enemy encounter, a powerful foe, requires an incredible 23 hours. The Ganondorf battle, which depletes Link's hearts as it progresses, is a memorable tense moment. The indestructible stick is after all just a stick. He can't always clone items during the fight.

So, is it possible? In a matter of speaking, he does defeat the dragon version of Ganon. But the game compels the player to use the Master Sword as the last strike, so technically, it's not fully a stick-only run. But what fun is that?

In the end, PointCrow removed more than 1,000 people in his Twitch chat. RIP.