I recently won XESTICLE going all Snake, beating M2K's DDD in the winner's final 3-1 and in the finals he took the first set barely 2-3 and then I won 3-2 x_x
I love Snake. I think he's the funnest character to play by FAR.
Anyway, basically all of his moves can kill, he's either the 2nd or third heaviest character, his recovery is one of the best, his projectile game is one of the best (though, I rarely ever use any of it), his tilts are GODLY, his out of shield game is GODLY, his dash attack canceled usmash is GODLY, his aerials are all situationally GODLY, his grabs are actually USEFUL! Wow, what a broken character.
I'm pretty convinced Snake is either the best or 2nd best character next to Meta Knight.
First off, my play style rotates completely around walking around. Yes, slowly walking around. I walk around and spacing myself in front of my opponent and I never use grenades or other projectiles unless the distance between us is quite far. Power shielding (sometimes just shielding is fine too) is another thing I do because it sets up for every Snake tilt/quick move out of shield. I like to randomly mortar slide to approach as his usmash makes him nearly unpunishable unless you like to eat falling bombs.
This was basically one of the only ways I could approach M2K's DDD without getting grabbed every single time. You can also do it instantly out of crawling backwards slowly, it looks hilarious.
His ftilt is downright broken, 21% damage fresh. It has ridiculous priority, comes out almost instantly, and the 2nd part has the most absurd range. It's the main move I use out of shield and to approach randomly, especially after mortar sliding behind them into a quick turn around ftilt.
His utilt has the most absurd range in the game for what the hitbox appears to look like. The range in front of him is down right insane, the utilt can actually reach below him and hit people on the ledge, and it has range above him that isn't too surprising for how long his leg is. The move comes out ridiculously fast and has one of the best KO power/speed ratios in the game. His utilt kills nearly every character at around 90-100%, and the heavy weight characters at around 110-120% as long as it's fresh.
His triple jab combo is extremely useful as well. The first jab comes out faster than ftilt does, and it also provides an interesting amount of stun time. You can actually jab to ftilt people or jab to utilt and it COMBOS. Yes thats right, COMBOS IN BRAWL!!!! OMG I LIKE THIS CHARACTER!!!
Errr sorry, getting a little excited. You can also jab, first hit of ftilt into utilt and it also combos as long as your timing is on. Another use is if you overspace your ftilt (which I do A LOT) and people try and punish you, you can usually just jab combo before they reach you.
I don't use his dtilt often but when I do it's to edge gaurd against people trying to double jump to the ledge, it's sort of hard to not make your character poke their head just barely above the ledge and eat a dtilt. Otherwise, I rarely use this move.
His usmash. Oh god, his usmash is so good. VS characters that don't have projectiles you can literally just stand in place and spam usmash and you are almost completely unapproachable. The placing of the mortar has a decent hitbox, the bombs coming down come down left or right randomly (only thing I hate), and it's ridiculously fast. I love to edge gaurd with usmash since I can get to the ledge almost instantly via mortar slide and charge usmash accordingly, then wait to see what my opponent does and quickly ledge hog, utilt their double jump to ledge (into the bomb), or run off and fastfall a back air (which sometimes hits them into the bomb or stage spikes them).
His nair does TWENTY-EIGHT % if all the hits connect. I love to use this move, if you full jump nair all the hitboxes come out but you land with landing lag, double jump nair auto cancels (straight into a beautiful ftilt or jab combo), I love to use this move because it has surprising range and priority and deals a LOT of damage. You can also wait for people to land on platforms and double jump up to them and nair at the same time, it completely destroys their shield and shield stabs a great majority of the time. Another use of nair is ledge jump -> instant nair. It completely destroys anyone jumping above the ledge. Oh god what a broken character!
I like his dair too, though I situationally use it the last hit of his dair is his strongest knockback aerial. You can ledge jump -> dair and the first kick or two will hit anyone standing near the ledge. You can also shield drop short hop a dair and usually all of the hits hit, but I prefer to play it safe and just ftilt instead. The move definitely has it's uses.
I rarely use his C4 except to recover. I placed a C4 in the "safe zone" of norfair during the lava wave and left it, and M2K didn't notice and ventured in while I shielded the lava wave, I detonated my c4 after and M2K took the damage. I think I underuse C4 but I'd rather use it to recover just in case I get gimped (Snake's up b can be grabbed if you do it too close to the ledge and he flies off and can't do up b again, unless you C4 recover). I have more consistant results if I just walk around in front of people and space/wait for them rather than fooling around with grenades and C4.
The Nikita Missile/over b... I rarely or never use. I'd rather use grenades or edge guard with Snake's broken hit boxes.
There's a number of grenade tricks I use, but rarely. Against DDD's that are not near perfect with chain throwing you can mash B to pull a grenade then as soon as you get grabbed you'll get dthrown into a grenade and escape, it's not worth it if you're already at the end of the stage, only if you're at the very beginning of the CG at the end of the stage facing the other side.
You can also hold a grenade and shield, it'll drop to your feet. I know most people already know this, but another trick I use is just picking up the grenade and approaching. Just run up to them and shield just before it blows up, the hitbox is rather large and you won't get hurt since you're shielding the grenade that just blew up in your hand... too good.
I rarely use his down smash mine except when I rarely mess up the mortar slide (I dash, hit down on the c stick to dash attack, then immediately press up + grab (z)) Sometimes I get combod into my own down smash and it just doesn't really seem to be worth the trouble.
Stickying people with C4 has to be one of the funnest things to do in Brawl. I have a number of ways of doing it securely. You can wait until people land on a platform, double jump up to them and they expect you to attack so they shield, then you just place the c4 on them because it goes through shields. Fastfall up air or utilt them up and detonate. Usually kills at around 50-60% before the uair/utilt. If you predict someone jumping from the ledge you can also jump with them at the same time and sticky them. If people are dumb enough to approach you then you can just power shield to sticky, then immediately jab combo or ftilt/utilt them into detonate for a sexy combo.
I'll add more as I think of it or just post in a new post, but I love Snake, he's the only reason I play Brawl. Thank God he's broken.
