oh snap this is brilliant! thank you for that guide. I lost my steam with this game since it was such a pain to deal with saves.

Really good route. Doing cheese after spaghetti is brilliant.

Sorry if it's obvious but I see a potential time skip in avoiding check points so you can use the shovel to get all the way back to the checkpoint you hit at 3:16.

Also, note that it's an "all squares are rectangles, not all rectangles are square" situation. Any one-crown level run on the first, second, or third crown would also be eligible for the single crown category, and the same run can be submitted for both if you so choose. The current record is for both single and first crown.

So yeah, it was a little weird coming up with categories for this game but yes. Single Crown with unrestricted items means you could do it on a run where you've already eaten the pizza two times and fully stocked up on items. Nobody has done this yet.

I am intending to do it but right now my game has no items unlocked because I did all my no items runs, and I've been too lazy to go back in and unlock everything.

For runs limited to the actual first crown, those would be level runs for first crown.

The barrier is not necessarily 100% complete. I have spoken to somebody who was able to execute some skips in the demo. He was looking for skips in the complete version but never got back to me. But it's still possible that there are skips in the game that can be pulled off using the olive oil or smoke bombs or in multiplayer mode by having one player revive the other at the right time.

Just because we haven't yet found any gaps, doesn't mean there's none to find necessarily.

So I figured I'd post a list of the items in Pizza Possum and what I think regarding their usefulness to speedruns. I'm doing this list from memory so bear with me if I forgot anything, I will add it later.

Passive Items:

• Pile of Food - If you have no other items unlocked, the item boxes simply drop a bunch of extra food. This allows no items runs to still be very fast. Early splits especially can be even faster in no items than in unrestricted runs, because the speed boost of bonus food adds up to even more than an item would have.
• Espresso - Run faster. It stacks. The more espressos you get early in the run, the more of a time save it will be, and the easier the run will be. Especially critical for escaping the diligent and fast gray wolf-life guards.
• Olive Oil - Survive being grabbed by guards one time. This is never bad to have. It can keep you from losing runs. If you don't have an active item going for the giant pizza, the olive oil is invaluable. Potentially useful for glitches involving having a guard pull you into another area.
• Bandit Mask - Makes you harder to spot. Not critical for speedruns but very helpful. This is the only way to eat the giant pizza without being spotted by Bella Chonki, meaning you can eat the pizza with no active guards attacking if you maneuver properly.
• After Dinner Mint - Prevents you from slowing down if you eat too much food too quickly and become bloated. This is huge. It saves time, it helps you escape guards, and it helps you do more efficient routes. One of the most important items to get early.
• Boxing Gloves - These are probably the best item in the game. Not only can you disable guards, but each guard carries one sandwich which is worth a good amount of food. The fastest way to get food seems to be to run from guard to guard collecting their sandwiches. You can often times run right up to their faces and bop them before they even notice you're there.
• Magnet - Collect food from farther away. Not critical, but helps run more efficient routes.
• Chef's Hat - This thing is kinda useless for speedrunning. I have confirmed via the devs on the official publisher discord. Yes, it makes food worth more points. However, the key meter gets longer to compensate. While each piece of food will be worth more points, you still need to eat the same amount of food to get a key. The same thing applies to the 1.5x multiplier you get while being chased. It's possibly useful to help unlock items mid-run in runs that allow it.... but that's about it. Disappointing item.

Active Items:

• Energy Drink - Active speed boost. Very useful for speedrunning for obvious reasons. I tried doing a run with only the energy drink unlocked and the early splits seemed slower than no items unlocked. Might be worth extra experimentation.
• Road Barrier - Useful to save yourself from being chased, not very useful for speed. Potentially useful for glitches in allowing you to climb onto inaccessible areas.
• Smoke Bomb - One of the best active items. If you throw one of these just before being caught, you will escape. If you have 2-3 of these when you get to the giant pizza, you will be able to eat it with no harassment from the guards. Potentially also useful for glitches involving guards pulling you into another area.
• Dog Mask - Guards don't bother you while you're wearing it, but you move very slowly. This is situationally useful. It can be used in conjunction with boxing gloves to steal sandwiches from guards with no danger. It can be used to steal the giant pizza with no danger as well. However, in most situations, due to the slowdown, the mask is less efficient than simply maneuvering to not be seen.
• Bag of Bones - Useful but situational. Using it to distract a dog who is chasing you will make the chase the bone, but it will also make the dog vulnerable to being bopped with the boxing gloves. You can use these to help eat the giant pizza but it is a very chaotic and active method of doing so.
• Cat in the Box - Distract a bunch of guards. You can then run in with the boxing gloves and gather up sandwiches very quickly. Can be used to draw in guards from still-locked areas to get extra sandwiches not normally available. Not a great choice for eating the giant pizza imo, as it requires finesse to not just end up swarmed to guards.
• Shovel - Warp back to your last checkpoint. This is basically useless for Any% runs, which require no backtracking. However, there are several points in a 100% run which potentially require backtracking, and I suspect that finding the ideal places to use the shovel will be what shapes the routes of 100% runs.

That's my thoughts, and I'm curious if anybody has anything to add.