Assassin's Creed II/Sequence 1

Escaping Abstergo

Abstergo

In the Animus, you can perform the movements as a baby before the prompts appear on the screen. After your father whispers in your ear, press in this order: legs, unarmed hand, armed hand, head.

In the large room with guards, follow Lucy until she stops to look down the main corridor, take that left and go all the way to the end. No enemies encountered and you get to ride the elevator right away.

Hideout

In the bit where you have to talk to Shaun, Lucy and the third person, you can exit the room and be able to run back inside for extra momentum. Since you start near the door after the cutscene, it won't take long and probably saves seconds.

Boys will be boys

The enemies seem to have varying amounts of health. Some go down from just a few punches, some should be countered to death. But how to know which are which? It's quicker to let Ezio get his ass kicked after his brother shows up to end the fight sequence. When Vieri runs away, the game drops two extra bodies on the street with the 100+ florins. You can tell which ones they are because they're dead, not rolling around in agony like the ones you beat up. They're dropped right next to each other, right by where you start searching bodies. If you didn't knock anyone out in the second wave and let them beat you, they're really easy to spot, usually all alone and that will let you search just two bodies to get the 200ƒ you need.

You should see the other guy

It's faster to not climb at all. Instead, just run from the left side and then take a turn to where the doctor awaits.

Sibling rivalry

While your brother is talking and you can only walk around, go right up to the church while he's talking and you'll start the memory there, with a huge head start. Just climb straight up the front of the church to the top.

Nightcap

Don't climb. Run again using the streets, it's a pretty simple route though there are enemies nearby at the spot where you turn into the alley to Cristina's house. Inside the house, you get three cutscene prompts. It's the quickest to activate the first one, but the other two, it probably makes no difference whether you activate them or not as far as timing goes. When you leave, head to the Auditore house, so you're close to the next mission start when you become anonymous.

Paperboy

Run on ground-level: around the yard of your house, to the east past the clothing store. Road curves to the left. Use an archway to your right. At crossroads, first run straight, and from the next crossroads to the right. Fight the three guards at the closest entrance instead of climbing and jumping down to avoid them. After passing on the letter, you can return using the same route (in reverse) and you won't have to deal with guards.

Beat a cheat

Run out of the house, around the yard towards the direction of your target, pretty much run straight. In the cutscene you get a prompt, but activating it slows things down since Ezio punches the guy first before speaking his next line. Just melee attack him with good timing to set up your combos, then run back the way you came.

Petruccio's secret

Climb on top of the nearest house from next to a marketstall nearby (fast climbing). Pick up the feathers in an order which allows you to jump down to ground level at the end (ignoring any damage you might take) for a fast sprint back to your house.

Friend of the family

The first "auto-scroller" of the game. You can pickpocket ravenously during the time Ezio's hands are free on the way to Leonardo's workshop. Running with the box is easy, and the route is simple to figure even impromptu.

Special delivery

Two of the targets are on a roof, one on ground level. The pigeon coop is direct line with your house, and can be accessed by a ladder easily, so maybe it should be the first to get picked? The route needs to be figured out on this one.

Jailbird

In the cutscene, there's a prompt which might again slow things down for a second (Ezio evades). So, run around your house's yard to the direction of the target, as before. Use a shadowy alley, which leads to a familiar street... then under an archway... a few turns, then you're at a marketplace. Run between two "boxes", then straight... for climbing up, using the right side of the building, and you may even do a shortcut to the clock tower through the roof - it doesn't matter if you're seen for a short while.

Family heirloom

Depending on from where you can do this, save warping might come in handy, since it teleports you to near your house's exit (reducing the distance you have to walk inside the house). For the guards, just run past the two of them and from there go to Uberto's place. There are two more hired guards in wait, and they know when you're coming from far away. Then just counter attack the four to death in front of Uberto's door. Running to the next mission might be tricky, because there are enemies situated around the most obvious route. But since you have to run for a decent while, maybe you can afford to be seen and can get out of their sight before reaching the next mission?

Last man standing

The enemy has seekers, so it's not an option to just run two blocks and hide in the closest hay pile, despite the hay piles being strangely abundant here. Run north, for about three blocks, outside the yellow search area, and then hide in a pile of hay.