Snake Man

"Nice dodge, but you won't be getting a second chance, Rockman."

- Snake Man

Snake Man (スネークマン) is a Robot Master with a snake motif created by Dr. Wily and Dr. Light to investigate narrow areas and survey topography on uninhabited planets marked for development. With his quick and lightweight body, he was well-suited for work on any kind of terrain. However, this caught the attention of Dr. Wily, who stole him, reprogrammed him into a combat robot, and sent him to work in order to fulfill his schemes. Snake Man is also the first Robot Master to have an animal-themed design.

Snake Man is intelligent and shrewd, but he can also be tenacious. He enjoys actively hunting and cornering his prey like a snake, which puts him at odds with the fair-minded Hard Man. He enjoys the company of Toad Man, for whom the feelings are unfortunately not mutual, and has a hatred of slugs.

His Special Weapon is the Search Snake, serpentine missiles that can move swiftly along the ground and even climb up walls. In Super Adventure Rockman he is shown to be able to dig underground to stay out of sight and ambush opponents, or to avoid their attacks.

Mega Man 3
Snake Man is one of the eight bosses. He follows a simple attack pattern of traveling back and forth across his room, jumping over the elevated area in the center as he does so and firing two Search Snakes when he stops on a side of the room opposite to Mega Man. However, as he runs from wall to wall he stops short a good distant from the wall itself before turning around, leaving a somewhat safe area for Mega Man to stand in.

A good strategy is upon entering the room is to just keep Mega Man positioned in front of the shutter, as standing in this position (close to a wall) will have Snake Man always turning around and running back the way he came. This will only make it necessary to focus on attacking Snake Man and jumping over his Search Snakes. His weakness is the Needle Cannon, but he can also be easily defeated using the Mega Buster. He is also weak to his own weapon, the Search Snake, but it can be only used in the rematch against him in Wily Castle. Shadow Blade also does decent damage.

Mega Man III
Snake Man is one of the first four bosses. His strategy is the same from Mega Man 3.

Mega Man's Soccer
Snake Man is a balanced player with a good tackle. In Tournament mode he is a member of the Cut Man, Wood Man, Needle Man, Pharaoh Man, Enker, and Proto Man teams. In League mode he is part of the Elec Man and Dust Man teams.

Super Adventure Rockman
Snake Man is one of the robots revived by Ra Moon in the Lanfront Ruins. He is the fourth boss from Episode 2, attacking Mega Man in an underground area. He attacks with Search Snakes and uses two rocks to protect himself. If the rocks are destroyed, he will dig underground to stay out of Mega Man's range. His weakness is the Crash Bomber.

Later in Episode 3, Snake Man is revived again, but Wily is betrayed by Ra Moon and his robots are attacked until they collapse. Snake Man and the other robots are apparently destroyed alongside Ra Moon's temple.

Other appearances

 * Snake Man has a cameo appearance in Mega Man 7 as one of the Robot Masters on display in the Robot Museum. Also, the museum's background music is a remix of the stage music from Snake Man, Heat Man, and Guts Man.
 * Snake Man has a brief appearance in the opening scene from Mega Man 8.
 * Snake Man appears in the CD database from Mega Man & Bass.
 * Snake Man appears in Battle Memory from Rockman ×over.
 * Snake Man appears as an enemy in the arcade game Adventure Quiz: Capcom World 2.

Rockman Complete Works data
ヘビのようにしつこく、じわじわ敵をおいつめる...かってに動きまわるので、こっちは動かずに攻撃しよう.

Mega Man Legacy Collection text: Like a tenacious snake, he steadily drives his prey into a corner... He moves about a lot, so stand still and attack.

Stage enemies
Enemies in Snake Man's stage, a long and steep area with an eerie snake-like motif.
 * Sub-boss: Big Snakey
 * Bomb Flier
 * Bubukan
 * Dada
 * Hammer Joe
 * Jamacy
 * Petit Snakey
 * Potton

Enemies in Snake Man's (Game Boy) stage:
 * Big Snakey
 * Bubukan MK-II
 * Dada
 * Hammer Joe
 * Ladder Press
 * Petit Snakey
 * Potton

Damage Data Chart
Amount of damage in units that Snake Man receives from each Special Weapon in Mega Man 3. * For Magnet Missile, there is no value as the projectile bounces off Snake Man rather than hitting and dealing 0 damage.

''* For Gemini Laser, it is possible to hit Snake Man with the projectile once it has bounced off a wall. If fired directly at him, the laser reflects and splits in two.''

Mega Man (Ruby-Spears)
In Ruby Spears' Mega Man animated series, the design of Snake Man's head and arm cannon are different. His eyes are yellow with red slitted pupils, and instead of lips his mouth is a plate that opens and closes when talking, and he often hisses when doing so. The eyes on his helmet are also different, and he has circular ears like other robots. The Search Snakes are fired as projectiles that can chew through many surfaces and objects.

Except for Cut Man and Guts Man, Snake Man is one of Dr. Wily's robots that had the most appearances in the series, being present in the episodes "Bot Transfer", "Campus Commandos", "Showdown at Red Gulch", "Brain Bots" and "Mega X".

A recurring joke is the use of the line "Try this/these on for size!" whenever the Search Snake is first used in an episode by a character, be it Snake Man, Mega Man, or even Mega Man X.

Snake Man is voiced by Ian James Corlett, who also voiced Mega Man and Rush.

Mega Man Megamix
Snake Man appeared in the manga Mega Man Megamix and Mega Man Gigamix.

In the story "Metal Heart" from Mega Man Megamix, Wily orders his robots from Mega Man 3 to go after Yellow Devil MK-II, which is out of control, and they make a truce with Mega Man to stop him. When Yellow Devil MK-II created a tunnel to escape, Snake Man, Beat and Tango go after him, but they argue and lose sight of him. Later, Snake Man, Top Man and Spark Man help Shadow Man save Mega Man when he was thrown from the building.

In Mega Man Gigamix vol. 1, Snake Man uses Search Snakes to map the space station in the story "Asteroid Blues", which is based on the events from Mega Man 3. In the stories from volumes 2 and 3, he assists Dr. Wily and the others in the battle against the Stardroids.

Rockman World 3
After Snake Man spots Mega Man in the woods, he sends his minions to attack, and later appears himself, surprising Mega Man with his Search Snakes. He is the first boss defeated by Mega Man.

Other appearances
Snake Man has brief appearances in the manga Rockman: Yomigaeru Blues as a member of the Wily Patrol and a cameo appearance in the Rockman 7 manga. He also appeared in some shorts from the manga Rockman 4Koma Dai Koushin.

Trivia

 * Snake Man is credited to liking Toad Man and disliking slugs; this most likely comes from a Japanese variation of Rock Paper Scissors; where Snake beats Toad (the snake can swallow the toad), Toad beats Slug (the toad can swallow the slug), and Slug beats Snake (the slug, by covering its prey with a slimy secretion, can destroy a snake). This would also explain why Toad Man is credited as disliking Snake Man also. Also, some snakes eat toads in real life.  Archie Comics makes a note to this in Sonic Universe #250, where Snake Man is seen waving at Toad Man while the latter stares at him suspiciously.
 * Hyleg Ourobockle and Burble Hekelot from Mega Man Zero 2 have a similar relation to Snake Man and Toad Man.
 * Shark Man's mugshot from the PC version of Mega Man 3 is an edited version of Snake Man's mugshot.
 * Snake Man's appearance in the "Mega X" episode of the Ruby-Spears cartoon may be a reference to the fact that, with some exceptions, the Maverick bosses in the Mega Man X series are also based on animals.
 * The tileset of Snake Man's stage is used in a complicated way for the Snakies. This is similar to Crash Man as he has complicated, looping layouts of pipes.
 * In the Ruby-Spears cartoon, Snake Man appeared in the most episodes out of all the Mega Man 3 Robot Masters.
 * During his cameo in the intro scene of Mega Man 8, Snake Man is shown riding on the head of a Big Snakey. This contradicts his actual boss fight, as he fights Mega Man by himself and not with the aforementioned enemy.