Hey, I'm glad you're taking a run at the game, I'm glad more people are looking to try it out. It's a lot to explain about how to cut time especially since there are a lot of little tricks that need to be done in the run. Athens is definitely a run killer since it's such a long level that includes a lot of running around, and to be honest it still gets me a lot of the time. For that, I would suggest trying out the routes or getting extra familiar with where enemies spawn compared to where you are (Yes, where you are on the map affects where some of the spies spawn). As for the last 3 levels, I haven't fully figured them out either, the priestesses are very random, death and circuses and its hoards of enemies slows me down a lot, same with gods of battle (I definitely got a little lucky in my record runs). I can tell you a little tip for the final boss though. You get 1 roll, then after that if you try to roll around him again he will jump across the arena. Other than that, little tips like shielding after a radial attack to cancel the lag animation, or pushing NPC's you need to escort by walking behind them with your guard up but not pushing them away from their checkpoints also work. If you want more in depth stuff I could try to make a guide if you want but I'm glad you're trying the run out.

I just got back into the speedrunning of this game, been trying to get my time back down to what I had. Should've been obvious to me but to get consistent minotaur you need to run back to the entrance so the minotaur will always run straight and you have access to his back instantly.

Might be obvious, but I also want to check to see who is still around. So if you stop by drop in a message real quick.

I was messing around with the sentinel fight recently and found that if you activate the Spear of Achilles power as the hydra head is charging you it will pop the head. This means that 3 heads can be popped in the first cycle of the slow stage, which will let us reach the fast stage of the fight faster. Then there are only 3 heads left to pop only there isn't another cycle in the slow stage.

I've found myself getting soft-locked a couple times because of this but if you set an infernus that needs to blow up to open a door or gate, eg. Gates of Saturn or Gods of Battle, if you set them on fire with a fire arrow or the spear ability they don't actually destroy what they are intended to destroy. Not sure if this is just a GameCube thing though.

Hey, I'm a little new to the scene as well. Although I have found that if you tap shield just before the animation ends it cancels the rest of it and lets you slash again