Movement speed: Ninja / Super Crash costumes > Anubis-Vicious (which I refer to as the "snake"..) > Crash slide jumping > Crash walking=jumping=spinning > other mutants

Mojo:

This stuff serves two purposes in the game.

1. When Crash has a full mojo meter and you aren't on a mutant, you can press the big circle in the middle of the touch screen to consume all the mojo to temporarily boost Crash's attack strength. The only known potential use of this in a speedrun is to speed up the final phase of Boss 2 by about 5 seconds. However doing so is not optimal in any% because you need to save the mojo for its other, more important purpose:

2. Mojo can be used to permanently upgrade the mutant you are currently holding. Each type of mutant has three forms, which I'll creatively refer to as Level 1 / 2 / 3. Each level gains an additional ability. Many of them are of questionable usefulness, but the a Level 3 Anubis-Vicious is amazing for fighting bosses. In the speedrun we absolutely want to pick up a snake in world 3, get it upgraded to Level 3 by the time you get to Boss 4, and keep that snake all the way until the final boss.

Any mojo picked up while controlling a mutant goes directly towards its "evolution meter". Any mojo picked up as Crash goes towards Crash's personal mojo meter for use #1 above, but Crash's mojo can be transferred to the mutant by pressing the big circle in the middle of the touch screen while controlling the mutant.

Here are the numbers for how mojo works.

• 5 small orbs = 1 big orb

• 40 big orbs = full Crash mojo meter

• Evolving a mutant from Level 1 to Level 2 = 60 big orbs

• Evolving a mutant from Level 2 to Level 3 = 80 big orbs

• When transferring mojo from Crash to a mutant, transferring a full Crash meter is only worth half to the mutant (i.e. 20 big orbs). Transferring less than a full Crash meter is worth at least a little less than half (exact math unknown). Thus, when looking to upgrade a mutant, it is preferable to pick up mojo with the mutant itself whenever reasonable.

• Evolving a mutant to Level 3 isn't possible until after you've beaten the respective boss, but mojo you collect with the mutant before beating the boss will count toward the mutant's evolution meter after beating it, up to a max of 40 orbs.

• The costumes that say "Faster growth for [insert mutant here]" double the worth of any mojo the mutant collects, including any transferred from Crash. This is not useful in any%.

• The Magician costume doubles the worth of mojo when collected by Crash, but does not affect mojo collected by a mutant. This is not useful in any%.

Any% route notes (refer to actual run for specifics, enough of the movement is executed correctly that you'll get the idea):

Each level is divided into sections separated by fadeouts. When I need to refer to a particular section, I will use the format e.g. 1-8.2 to refer to the 2nd section of 1-8.

1-1 Have to take the first Spike, need it for knocking down trees until 1-8

1-2.4 Get to secret exit with the boulder hidden in a bush

1-6.1 Using Spike's special is the only way to get to and past the tree.

1-8.2 Fastest to spin-bounce double jump off the Level 2 Spike here to get over the tree. Can pull out your Spike to knock down the tree normally if you fail the jump; keep out your Spike afterward in this case. 1-8.3 Throwing away your mutant midair allows you to effectively get an extra jump. Do this to get over the tree; you no longer need this mutant.

1-Bonus Get the free Level 2 Spike here and then exit, it's faster and more consistent than fighting and keeping the Level 2 Spike in 1-8.2

1-Boss Almost every boss has some amount of (currently unmanipulatable) RNG in its behavior, this one included. No matter what this boss does though, you absolutely want to hit him with attacks in the following order: spikes -> 2 heavy -> spikes -> usually 1 heavy, or 2 light if situation calls for it

2-1.5 Hit the eel with spikes, take it, then use the eel's heavy attack to kill your old spike; the barrier won't disappear until it dies

2-2.3 The exact spacing of the stampeding enemies slightly varies randomly, be ready to react 2-2.5 Carefully jump over the portal use eel to hit the switch to unlock the secret exit

2-7.3 Hitting the first necessary switch without activating the moving platforms as intended requires standing very close to the left edge of the bottom platform; if you are too far away, you will not hit the switch. 2-7.5 If you don't want to do the precise jump to skip the first 3 enemies, use the eel's special to kill them. Eel's special is necessary to get past the second set of 3 enemies.

2-8.2 Skipping underneath both crystals requires falling in height over the edge a bit before jumping 2-8.3 Optimal to kill all these enemies with two 2-heavy combos 2-8.6 Not possible to get on top of the first bull to ride him, damage abusing over electricity is much faster than waiting for the next bull

2-Boss Phase 1 Boss won't move to the foreground until you either hit him, or a certain amount of time passes, so try to hit him with the eel's light attack. Right at the start, move right and use the eel's light attack to aim where the boss will hopefully move. RNG may make him move left instead, but if you wait to react to his direction, it'll probably be too late to get the quick hit. Once he comes to the foreground, optimally hit him with 3 specials and then mash jumping off the eel to get away from him. Getting distance upon phase end is necessary to prevent him from shooting a heavy attack before jumping to the background, but being close in the first place is necessary to improve the odds of actually hitting with all your specials. If you fail to hit with 3 specials, use light attacks to end the phase, preferably from a bit of a distance so you can keep the eel out upon phase end without triggering the boss's heavy.

Phase 2 No RNG in his movement this time, hit him twice in the background. When he comes forward, hit with two specials and again mash putting away the eel if necessary to get distance.

Phase 3 If you've put away the eel, don't take it back out for this phase, it's not worth the time it takes. If you've kept it out, put it away as soon as it's too low on energy to use its special attack. Use charged-up Crash heavy attacks to finish the fight.

World 3 little enemies can stun you, avoid being in front of them on the ground wherever there is a risk of this

3-1.5 Attack the snake from a distance to avoid having it trying to fight you or dodge your attacks. Take it and kill your eel to lower the barrier faster. Now that you have the snake, you'll want to use it for large amounts of movement throughout the run since it moves faster horizontally than Crash, especially on the quicksand in world 3.

3-2.3 After using the whirlwind from the first cactus, break the 3rd cactus to reach the secret exit

3-7.5 Knock as many enemies off the right edge into the pit as you can

3-8.3 Fight and take the Level 2 snake here. This is the snake you'll keep and upgrade, so pay close attention to mojo collection from here until the end of 4-8; you need a lot of mojo, but it doesn't require ever going far out of your way for it with a good mojo collection route. Note that there is some RNG in the mojo drops from boxes and enemies, so don't cut it too close.

3-Boss There's a lot of RNG in this boss's behavior and I don't really know what to do about it. Just spam light attacks unless you start to notice any useful patterns.

4-1.1 Now that Boss 3 is dead, you can start working on your snake's Level 3 evolution. Crash's mojo meter will easily be full by this point, so immediately transfer it to the snake so Crash can begin collecting more.

Not much to write about world 4 in general, just learn the movement and collect lots of mojo, taking out the snake whenever it's worth it since mojo collected by Crash is only worth half towards evolution. Upgrade to Level 3 when you reach the fight in 4-8.6. Mojo no longer matters once you've done this upgrade.

4-Boss The ice beam machine above you can either be really annoying, or really useful if you time it to freeze the boss.

Phase 1, delay the ice beam until just before boss comes on screen, then hit with a full light attack combo, ending the phase immediately.

Phase 2, put the next ice beam on the middle vent. Try to delay it slightly so the next ice beam takes long enough to not interfere with your fight, but delaying too much will fail to hit the boss in the background. When boss comes forward, use light attacks until the boss gets to slightly under half health, then use your Level 3 ultimate attack (R+B) to finish the fight, completely skipping Phase 3.

5-1.3 Here we have the only bonus round in the any% route, to get the Astronaut costume. Equip the costume after finishing this level. Horizontal movement is slower with this costume than with normal Crash, but the high jump is very useful throughout world 5, and it's also necessary to reach the 5-2 secret exit without getting rid of the snake.

5-2.6 Carefully jump over the portal to continue on to secret exit

5-7 I believe I can flyyyy

5-8.4 Use snake's head to break the body slam boxes from below, skipping an entire long descent and climb

5-Boss The only boss with no relevant RNG. Do exactly as my run does, quick and easy fight.

Final Boss This boss's behavior is rather confusing and hard to manage. This fight can be done MUCH faster than in my 46:44, but when I last worked on this game I didn't finish developing the strats to do so with any reasonable degree of consistency, so good luck with this fight for now LOL. The important points to note:

• It is sometimes possible to interrupt the boss as he tries to move to the background. Only the "heavier" attacks in your light attack combo can interrupt him, the weaker attacks in the combo cannot. Thus, in order to interrupt the boss deliberately, you must carefully manage how much damage you do to the boss, so that one of your heavier attacks will line up with the point at which the boss tries to rush to the background.
• Boss's second and further attempts at regenerating health can be interrupted; do so by hitting with a well-timed heavy attack for maximum damage.

100%: Since the leaderboard is empty right now I obviously didn't finish working out everything for this category, but I'll post the basic route as it stands from what I did work out in case someone wants to run it. Whenever a level says "Exit" that means to exit back to the map as soon as you touch the platform at the end of the bonus round; you don't need to reach the end of level portal or even wait for Crash's air guitar to complete in order to keep the item you earn from the bonus round.

1-1 (Bonus) 1-2 Secret 1-6 (Bonus) 1-8 (Bonus) 1-Boss 2-1 2-2 Secret 2-7 (Bonus) 2-8 2-Boss 3-1 3-2 Main 3-3 (Bonus) 3-4 (Bonus) ← Ninja 3-6 (Bonus) 3-8 3-Boss 4-1 4-2 Secret 4-7 (Bonus) 4-8 4-Boss 5-1 (Bonus) 5-2 Main 5-5 (Bonus/Exit) 5-2 Secret 5-7 (Bonus) 5-8 5-Boss Final Boss Bonus (Exit) ← Super Crash 4-2 Main (Bonus) 4-4 4-5 (Bonus) 4-6 (Bonus, Exit) 3-2 Secret 3-7 (Bonus, Exit) 2-2 Main (Bonus) 2-3 2-4 (Bonus) 2-5 (Bonus, Exit) 1-2 Main 1-3 (Bonus, Exit)