This movie is conceptually something between our very first 2 Rockman publication. It uses some tricks
[5] NES Mega Man by Morimoto in 21:52.10 didn't know about, but even in 5M there were some screen wraps this movie avoids. Then,
[111] NES Mega Man by Bisqwit in 18:21.03 uses the same pause glitch as here, but it already does plenty screenwraps and zips.
Optimization level was not compared, but in fact - is it anyhow visible? I fail to notice how this run is superior to any of the first 2 publications.
Primarily, why would we want a run that avoids some time-saving strats? Because it looks more like the old runs we had here, but it applies the current optimization level to them, and tricks that were not known back then. And the result does look different than the old runs.
This applies to pacifist runs very well, because the difference is obvious, and the new category requires interesting route changes that are noticeable in real time. Hence, we do like such a movie and it is accepted to Moons.
The same sometimes happens to low glitch runs. Latest runs are so glitchy they skip significant amount of gameplay, so people are interested in how would TASing the whole gameplay look like.
[862] Genesis Pulseman "no motion glitch" by IdeaMagnate in 33:57.15
[1937] Genesis Sonic the Hedgehog "no zips" by Aglar in 17:36.58
So what is so modern in this submission that was not seen in the old runs? Optimization level alone? It's very hard to tell by an untrained eye, or rather, without comparing every scene frame by frame. Then what is so old-school-ish in this run that isn't seen in modern ones? No screen-wraps/zips/memory corruption? But pause glitches are still here. They still don't let us see how would a modern TASer beat this game, within intended route.
I'd say, if one really has something to offer about this game, no glitches should be used, to actually differ from all movies we had. BTW, it's not even about what is possible in real time, because many glitches avoided here are possible. But what can be argued is, what glitch to allow? I'd say, all pause abuses must be avoided too. They were likely not presented as a feature, even though it was programmed this way. And we've already seen them since the second publication of this game. They add nothing new.
But again, it all would work only if a runner has something to offer. Which must be possible to tell in real time. In real time I only see that this is probably faster than Morimoto's run. But I'm not sure it deserves a category like this.
So my vote is not just No. I vote against this glitch choice.
This run seems to be liked, but did anyone ask himself a question: What does this run show that was unseen? This way we could even unobsolete some of the old runs,
[111] NES Mega Man by Bisqwit in 18:21.03 is still faster than this one.