Twitch Personality Dedicates Thirty-Seven Straight Attempting to Beat <em>Tears of the Kingdom</em> With Only a One Branch

One could think that two years post-launch since Tears of the Kingdom arrived, fans would have exhausted novel challenge runs that apply unique restrictions on a gameplay session. Yet, although many players have tried to finish the game using just a stick, content creator PointCrow stands out as the player who endeavored to beat the game with a one branch—specifically, the exact same one throughout.

The streamer is famous for such challenge runs, such as the time he went through the title solely with explosives or the attempt where he aimed to defeat the story with zero energy. A one-branch run, though, seems impossible at face value. There's the game's introduction, which requires the hero to wield the legendary blade. Additionally, there's the whole weapon wear mechanic, which is especially important when working with the most fragile tool in the entire game. But if the stick shatters, that's the end. It's over.

So, How?

How did he do it? The straightforward answer is exploits. The full story, believe it or not, is parallel universes. It turns out, you can manipulate the game's save file system to have separate game sessions that impact one another. So the creator does a “setup” file where he advances standardly, and the real save, where he's limited. The setup save has him completing the intro and initial starting area, and this character acquires maximum endurance and health. From here, he starts a cutscene and halts midway through to instruct the software to load an auto-save from the branch-only file. The system gets mixed up and creates a third game file that combines the conditions of the first two files.

This creates fresh issues, however. The merged save file has a protagonist that never acquired the capability to enter shrines. Fortunately, this is an issue that the file exploit fixes readily, but pulling it off means depending on an unstable build of the title that fails to open some locations. Like everything else, he has a clever solution for it: He begins the game on its pre-release version 1.0, and then patches the game partway through to make sure it begins functioning correctly.

Bypassing Weapon Wear and Other Challenges

Curiously, the introductory version of the hero is programmed so that he cannot break any weapons he wields, presumably to prevent a scenario where the player gets stuck at the beginning of the game. But that's also how PointCrow gets around the durability problem, as the Link he transfers between universes is the version from the beginning of the game. It's a clever technique, but not a method that eradicates all potential friction. The stick is nonetheless a weak item that makes encounters tedious. But at that point, it's all a question of determination and perseverance. It also helps that there's a duplication glitch that gives him an plentiful supply of consumables to boost his strength, or stock up on healing spirits. He additionally makes use of a bug that allows Link to clip through the world. Some would consider these means grounds to question the validity of the run, but to my view, he's a resourceful player who is ready to do whatever it takes to entertain his audience. He further implements a safeguard of sorts stating that, for each fairy he uses, he'll remove a viewer from his live stream, creating an motivation to not depend too much on them.

Boss Fights and the Final Encounter

The streamer manages to defeat many of Tears of the Kingdom's bosses, but the fights appear painful. The YouTube edit of his quest doesn't make the audience sit through the entire conflicts, which is a good thing when a few of them last several hours. One boss fight, Queen Gibdo, requires an incredible twenty-three hours. The Ganondorf battle, which erases the hero's hearts as it unfolds, is a memorable nail-biter. The indestructible stick is after all only a stick. He is unable to necessarily clone objects midway the fight.

So, is it possible? Technically, he does overcome the dragon version of Ganon. But the game forces the player to use the legendary weapon as the last strike, so technically, it's not completely a branch-exclusive playthrough. But where's the challenge in that?

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