Yes, I know there are already five other Any% guides, but I thought I might put in my two cents for anybody who’s just getting into this and is aiming for a time in the 5:30-6:00 range.

Please Note: A few of these strategies will not work for Second Quest since the enemies move too fast.

World 1-1 Minimum Time To Aim For: 369

Your biggest obstacle in this level is going to be the underground section. If you’re trying to get out of there with 380 in-game seconds left on the timer, you need to jump onto the platform and either jump off on the left side with a full jump or either jump off on the right side with a small-as-possible jump. Getting that 380 can be really hard even if you think you did it perfectly, and you’ll still be on pace even if you don’t get it, so don’t sweat it too much. If you’re just trying to get a 379, you can skid to a stop while you’re on the platform and easily go inside the pipe.

After you get back outside, you’ll need to figure out how to tackle the staircase. What I do is aim for the fourth stair and do two full jumps afterward, but to my knowledge, any stair works just fine, so do whatever you’re most comfortable with. Just know that whatever jumps you end up doing are going to be precise and may take some practice.

World 1-2 Minimum Time To Aim For: 341

My advice is to run-jump into the block that’s underneath the four coins and kick the second Koopa to the right to take out all of the other enemies. That way, you only have to make one semi-precise jump over/under the Goomba that tries to land on top of you.

If you pull off a good turnaround into the warp zone and get into the left pipe without any slowdowns, you’ll end the level somewhere in the low 340s.

World 4-1 Minimum Time To Aim For: 340

I honestly don’t even think you should need my help with this one. The staircase might trip you up on occasion, but other than that, this is a level that I think anybody can get a perfect time on within 15 minutes of practice (and I do mean anybody).

World 4-2 Minimum Time To Aim For: 351

I’m not going to go over how to do Fast 4-2 here. For that, check out Kosmic’s tutorial and skip to 10:07:

Anyway, you want to land on the second part of the missing floor (be careful not to let go of A too early), Then jump again into the alcove. Avoid the three Goombas and jump onto the elevator, and with a decently-timed jump, you should be able to hit the block that has the vine in it. Two blocks to the right, you need to hit a hidden block that’ll help you get to the vine and reach the warp zone. After practicing this level a few times, you should consistently be able to get out of there with a mid-370s time.

The warp zone has another staircase and the ceiling here is even lower than it was in 1-2, so if you’re trying to do it optimally, you’ll need an even better turnaround.

World 8-1 Minimum Time To Aim For: 190

If you’re like me and you’re not very good at doing pipe jumps, then the hardest part of the level is going to be getting over Pipe A. The reason this is as tricky as it is is because there are three Goombas right after it. You’ll need to jump earlier than you think so you can kill the second Goomba and safely make it through. If you jump too early, you’ll get eaten by the Piranha Plant, and if you jump too late, you’ll run into the third Goomba and die (there’s a chance you’ll jump on the third Goomba and be safe if you jump just a bit later though).

Soon after that, you’ll get to what I like to call the “boxing ring”, which is this Paratroopa that’s in between two block towers. If this is your first run, I recommend jumping on top of the boxing ring and doing another jump off of the row of blocks to also avoid the next two Paratroopas, but you can also do slow jumps in and out of the ring if that’s more your speed. Doing that optimally will save five in-game seconds, but obviously, it’s riskier.

Again, a couple more slowdowns will have to be made if you can’t manage pipe jumps, but the rest of the level is manageable.

World 8-2 Minimum Time To Aim For: 310

The first half of this level isn’t much more than what you’re used to by now. You’ll have to land on the second stair of the staircase and do two full jumps afterwards, but if you find that to be too much, you can hide on the third stair and wait for the Paratroopa to pass you. After that, you just need to hop on top of some Bill Blasters and you’ll be home free until you get to three Paratroopas that I like to call “Charlie’s Devils”.

The reason I call them Charlie’s Devils is that they are never doing the same thing twice unless you happen to be on the same framerule (that’s 21 frames, or 0.35 seconds), so for beginners, getting past them quickly, safely, and consistently is pretty much out of the question. If you go down Pipe A, Charlie’s Devils will despawn and getting through the rest of the level will be a lot easier if you’re good at timing your jumps at full speed, but I’m told that this costs more time than it saves, so pick your poison.

World 8-3 Minimum Time To Aim For: 239

This level is without a doubt going to be the hardest one for you if you’re a beginner. This level is infamous for having eight Hammer Bros in it, and just like with Charlie’s Devils, where they are depends on how long it took for you to get here in the first place. Not all hope is lost, however. There is a Google Doc that you can use to memorize all 132 of the Hammer Bros. patterns which I’ll leave here: https://www.speedrun.com/smb1/guide/zef9c

But if all that is too much for you, I’ll tell you what I like to do. I brush up against the second Bill Blaster (they don’t fire if you’re touching them so use that to your advantage if you can), I go on the bottom when dealing with the first pair of Hammer Bros, I go on top when dealing with the second pair of Hammer Bros, and I jump over the last four Hammer Bros. Then I jump up to the third stair on the staircase and fall to the flagpole below. You’ll still make it if you’re going at full speed.

If I had to give a rough estimate, I would say I’ve had a 35% success rate of using this strat. If that’s too low for your liking, then I recommend showing up to this level with a Fire Flower.

World 8-4 Minimum Time To Aim For: 270

First Room: Start holding Right+B and jump once you land on the second stair. Keep going until you get to the lava pit. If you’re going at full speed, you only have a three frame (0.05 second) window to make this jump. The safer but slower strat is to fall onto the metal raft and jump from there. Don’t worry about the Piranha Plant in Pipe C, it’ll always despawn before you can run into it.

Second Room: There’s a lot of enemies here that can screw you up, so I recommend taking this one at a slower pace. Hit the invisible block, watch out for the two Paratroopas, and hop inside Pipe E.

Third Room: This one is pretty straightforward. You have the option of going into Pipe A if you scroll your screen far enough (if you don’t scroll far enough you’ll end up back in the first room), which is faster when you do it optimally, but I’m personally more comfortable with Pipe G because you’re much less likely to die to Cheep Cheeps doing that.

Fourth Room: Not really much I can say about this one. I recommend playing it safe here too if possible.

Fifth Room: Start holding Right+B again and do a full jump once you get onto the ground so you can kill the Hammer Bro before he becomes a threat. Do a medium jump in between the Podoboo and the wall and you’ll be face to face with Bowser. If he jumps towards you, run under him. If he jumps away from you, jump over him. There’s a decent chance you’ll survive his hammers since the game only allows for six hitboxes to be on-screen at a time.