There are many people who say that Mega Man 2 is the greatest game in the Mega Man franchise. Those people are what I like to refer to as “wrong.” Mega Man 2, while an outstanding piece twitchy platforming fun that corrected many of the unfriendlier aspects of the original game, doesn’t hold a candle to the blessing that is Mega Man 3.
Released in North America in 1990 (and only hitting the EU in 1992 thanks to Nintendo picking up publishing duties), Mega Man 3 was the first game to include the slide feature, introduced us all to Proto Man, and saw the creation of robot’s best friend in the indispensable Rush. It was also the first game with US box art that didn’t depict Mega Man as a guy with a gun. Those four reasons alone are enough to put it at the top of the Mega Man Mega Mountain, but the reason I easily consider it the best the series has ever seen is because of Snake Man, the greatest Robot Master Capcom has ever created.
Snake Man’s origins are quite boring. He was created by Dr. Light to survey topography of uninhabited planets and investigate narrow passages. That’s a goddamn snoozer right there. But even with such a lackluster profession, he has such a badass design. The first Robot Master to be based off an animal and Capcom went straight to the coolest looking creature on the planet. With his long, snake headpiece and giant white shoulder pass, he exemplified what was considered radical, tubular and gnarly in the late 80s, early 90s. But unlike the big-ass shoulder pads regularly worn by Dorothy, Rose, Blanche, and Sophia, his never went out of style. I’m glad this Robot Master turned evil because something that chill shouldn’t be relegated to sampling the land like a balding 50-year-old with a geology degree from some state school.
Not only is he great, but his level is outstanding. Coated in several shades of green, it features dozens of snakeheads, large and small, that try to kill you as you make your way along an intertwining pathway of snake bodies before heading to the sky to dodge missiles disguised as clouds. If you manage to get through it and beat him, Mega Man gains the Search Snake power-up, allowing him to unleash an army of snakes to take down any robots unlucky enough to stand against him. If the Nazis had him on their side, Indiana Jones would have been fucked.
So yeah, Snake Man is absolutely #1, and there ain’t no one who can tell me otherwise.
via destructoid http://ift.tt/2okqU6l