Mega Man Zero - Aztec Falcon Pacifist Run
27Taking on Zero’s first mission in service of the Resistance as a pacifist. Aztec Faclon’s stage is fitting for this challenge and can be completed with 0 enemies defeated on the results screen. Here are the details.
The opening section is littered with every MMZ player’s favorite enemy, Spikings. However, under pacifist conditions, there’s very little reason to dread them. Spikings are only really an issue when you actively engage them in combat, though I suppose that “combat” should be used loosely considering that they just roll toward you. In any other type of run, be it a speedrun or an S-Rank run, fighting Spikings is mandatory to build Saber EXP or gather enemy score. Without those being points of consideration, you’re free to leap over them without a care in the world. Using floor tiles and background elements as signposts makes this an easy task even with the Spikings’ propensity for blindsiding unsuspecting players.
The first part that demands a smidgen of brainpower is the climb past the collapsed building. Patrolled by a series of Pantheon Hunters, devising a specific route is necessary for smooth passage. Performing wall jumps off the corners of the ledges that the first two Hunters occupy allows Zero to bypass the first Hunter and evade the three-round burst of the second Hunter. From there, I navigate to the point just below the health pickup on the crane and dally there for a second, the purpose being to have the Hunter lurking above turn around and walk away. Hasty players will find themselves hampered by the position of that Hunter and its perpetual firing toward Zero. Similarly, I don’t immediately speed toward the Contrainter—which is the name for the weather-altering machine—rather, I wait for it to oscillate upward just enough for Zero to slink by.
Now for the four Totem Cannons. This sector is the bottleneck for this run. You’ll notice that I don’t alter the wind’s direction by attacking the crystal on the Contrainer. Although doing so wouldn’t strictly violate pacifist principles, as the crystal is incapable of taking damage, I still wanted to see if gamboling over the Totems was feasible without having to make any concessions. As it turns out, the answer is yes; even the tempestuous storm constantly forcing Zero backward isn’t enough to stop him, but the maneuvers required to proceed are not without pain.
Zero’s elevation in relation to the Totem that he’s approaching is the key. The precision demanded to make any given jump over a Totem with unfavorable winds at play is directly tied to this metric. The first one is at the bottom of a slope, and so, is a cakewalk. The next two are on flat ground, so they merit some practice to learn how to consistently jump over. That leaves the fourth totem, which is on a ledge above Zero, as the pernicious trap that’ll toss you back to the start of the stage.
Truthfully, I have no dependable method to replicate the requisite jump. I simply repeated the actions until my success rate approached somewhere between 10-20%. The core precept is to avoid jumping too high; the more time Zero spends in the air, the more time the Totem has to rise and block your path. Landing as far left as possible on the ledge and jumping within a frame or two after landing is the likeliest path to success. A delayed dash jump can help if you land a bit closer to the Totem, but it’s not explicitly necessary.
No cause for celebration after clearing that jump, though. Pay attention to the pace with which you climb the wall prior to the second Contrainer. There’s a specific rhythm that’ll avoid crashing into the ascending Carryarm while also giving you enough space to safely hop over the Pantheon Hunter and its bullets. Wall jumping off the corner below the Contrainier is ever so slightly faster than climbing the ladder, but it’s inessential. The Pantheon flanked by spike pits is the last truly unnerving part; it’s not excruciating, but I did lose one run there.
For Aztec Falcon, there isn’t much to say about the fight itself. I chose to use the Buster as the most “pacifist” way of handling things. However, astute viewers will notice something odd: despite the decision to use half-charged shots, I deal only 1 damage on multiple occasions. This leads me into today’s non sequitur: MMZ Buster charging mechanics.
In the first two games, there’s no delay between releasing a charged shot and firing a small pellet; as soon as you press the button to begin charging again, a pellet will be released. Contrast this to Z3/Z4, where there’s a 5-frame window in which you can press the attack button and avoid shooting a pellet. Presumably, this change was made to avoid the exact scenario you see here, where the pellet strikes before the half-charged shot, but amusingly, the change is technically superfluous because uncharged shots have a combo value of 0 in Z3/Z4, which remedies the issue.
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