Solid Snake's Contest History

Who is Solid Snake?
Solid Snake is the last hope we have going for us all. He is the only one standing between the shithole world we live in now and the shithole world we live in now......only with a plethora of nuclear bomb craters being the difference in the latter. Sent in against all odds, Solid Snake uses his stealth and battle tactics to defy those odds and save the Earth from nuclear devastation. His most popular venture into the world of video games would be the PSX smash hit, Metal Gear Solid, however Snake's video game roots run quite deep. "David" goes way back to the NES days under the clever guise of "Metal Gear" (so confusing.....)

Solid Snake's badass character and unshakeable poise is the biggest thing going for him in the field and is what separates him from the pack in the Summer Contest. To vote against Solid Snake is to vote against one of the biggest badasses in video gaming, and as seen by his success in the Summer Contest.....that's very difficult to do.

"The cardboard box that you have is ideal for fooling your enemies. It's a very important tool for infiltration missions." - Solid Snake

Solid Snake's Contest History
Win-Loss Record: 26-7

Summer 2002 Contest - East Division - 2 Seed
 * Eastern Round 1--- Defeated (15) Squall Leonhart, 46897 [65.43%] - 24779 [34.57%]
 * Eastern Quarterfinal --- Defeated (7) Knuckles the Echidna, 41335 [60.71%] - 26748 [39.29%]
 * Eastern Semifinal --- Defeated (11) Aeris, 42545 [56.54%] - 32702 [43.46%]
 * Eastern Final --- Lost to (5) Crono, 46697 [47.07%] - 52517 [52.93%]
 * Extrapolated Strength --- 9th Place [35.23%]

Summer 2003 Contest - West Division - 1 Seed
 * Western Round 1 --- Defeated (16) Raiden, 84638 [82.88%] - 17480 [17.12%]
 * Western Quarterfinal--- Defeated (8) Knuckles the Echidna, 61038 [63.13%] - 35646 [36.87%]
 * Western Semifinal --- Defeated (5) Ryu, 61510 [57.26%] - 45915 [42.74%]
 * Western Final --- Lost to (1) Mega Man, 55322 [46.50%] - 63639 [53.50%]
 * Extrapolated Strength --- 8th Place [34.74%]

Summer 2004 Contest - 20XX Division - 2 Seed
 * 20XX Round 1 --- Defeated (15) Tanner, 74251 [94.30%] - 4492 [5.70%]
 * 20XX Quarterfinal --- Defeated (10) Knuckles the Echidna, 48481 [59.54%] - 32946 [40.46%]
 * 20XX Semifinal --- Defeated (6) Frog, 44992 [51.39%] - 42563 [48.61%]
 * 20XX Final --- Lost to (1) Mega Man, 37517 [42.81%] - 50116 [57.19%]
 * Extrapolated Strength --- 12th Place [30.82%]

Solid Snake has been a monster against average strengthed characters year in and year out. He can also hang around with the best of them in big matches, however he just doesn't have that extra bite to pull off a shocking win against some of the big name Square and Nintendo names in the field. As a character that DOESN'T hail from either Square or Nintendo's camp, Solid Snake does a hell of a job. Beating up on poor echidnas seems to be this man's main hobby as he's been the death of Knuckles in every Summer Contest to date, but Knux always puts up a good fight. On the other side of the coin, Mega Man has twice doused Snake in a division finals match, with the latest brawl being further from the first result in terms of vote difference, thus it's safe to say that Solid Snake won't be taking down Mega Man anytime soon. Solid Snake can take pride in one amazing feat though. He is the closest any character has come to pitching a perfect no-hitter in vote numbers. Tanner could only manage a pathetic 4492 votes against Snake in a 2004 Round 1 clash, the worst vote numbers in ANY contest. Snake fans can be a bit worried of their man's place amongst the elite after a scare from Chrono Trigger's Frog in 2004. The newcomer amphibian put up a startline 48.6% on the champion of Metal Gear after winning the match against "brother" Liquid Snake with 50.05% earlier in Round 1. The close match against what many believed to be an "average strengthed" Square character does not bode well for contest success in the near future for Solid Snake. However, the Metal Gear name has proven to be strong thanks to Liquid's efforts vs Frog. It's all in the genes, I suppose.........

Solid Snake certainly won't be winning any tournaments with powerhouses like Link, Sephiroth and Cloud in the running but he WILL go deep into the tournament year in and year out. The Final Four is out of reach so far for Snake, but with MGS3 on it's way (never mind that it most likely won't BE Solid Snake as the lead man in MGS3....), Solid Snake's reputation as a badass and fan base will constantly grow.

Summer 2005 Contest - Gear Division - 1 Seed
 * Gear Round 1 --- Defeated (8) Manny Calavera, 77063 [84.09%] - 14576 [15.91%]
 * Gear Semifinal --- Defeated (5) Zelda, 58421 [54.41%] - 48941 [45.59%]
 * Gear Final --- Defeated (2) Sora, 63664 [65.26%] - 33887 [34.74%]
 * Elite Eight --- Defeated (3) Bowser, 51387 [50.59%] - 50191 [49.41%]
 * Final Four --- Lost to (1) Mario, 44483 [42.79%] - 59463 [57.21%]
 * Extrapolated Strength --- 9th Place [33.88%]

After three years straight of going down in the Elite 8, Solid Snake was finally able to get over the hump and into the Final Four in a big way. And it wasn't just him getting to the Final Four that was awesome, but how he did it.

Snake was discredited after virtually every one of his matches, and Bowser taking him down in the Elite 8 this year was a very sexy upset special given what Bowser did in Spring 2005. The rumblings got very loud after Snake was "only" able to score 84% against Manny Calavera in a match where most people were expecting another Snake/Tanner affair. In fact, the ridiculous expectations laid upon Snake were so bad that people even expected him to lose to Zelda.

But people started believing in Snake somewhat after he beat Zelda with the worst picture we've ever seen in a contest match, followed by him absolutely tearing Sora to bits. Snake had all the momentum heading into his match with Bowser, at least until the Elite 8 round were filled with sprite match pics. However, despite all of the whining about how Snake was being screwed over by the match pic, he took off against Bowser, held off Bowser's comeback attempt and got into the Final Four in dramatic fashion.

Yes he was destined to being little more than Mario's sock puppet, but Snake actually did fairly weel given the momentum that Mario had going into that match. Snake even found it within himself to win a few updates, and for most Snake fans this was satisfaction enough. It isn't known whether or not Snake will ever truly get over the hump and into the contest elites (or if he'll even find himself as something other than the weak link of the Noble Nine....), but this was a contest performance that cannot be taken away from him.

Summer 2006 Contest - Patriot Division - 1 Seed
 * Patriot Round 1 --- Defeated (8) Soma Cruz, 89697 [82.15%] - 19487 [17.85%]
 * Patriot Semifinal --- Defeated (4) Squall, 78314 [57.59%] - 57666 [42.41%]
 * Patriot Final --- Defeated (6) Yoshi, 69085 [57.16%] - 51781 [42.84%]
 * Elite Eight --- Defeated (2) Mega Man, 70163 [55.33%] - 56648 [44.67%]
 * Final Four --- Defeated (1) Sonic the Hedgehog, 75864 [54.99%] - 62097 [45.01%]
 * Finals --- Lost to (1) Samus, 59987 [46.89%] - 67947 [53.11%]
 * Extrapolated Strength --- 3rd Place [46.89%]

Battle Royale
 * Battle Royale Day 1 --- Outlasted Samus, 20903 [13.12%] - 12335 [7.74%]
 * Battle Royale Day 2 --- Outlasted Mario, 20954 [14.76%] - 15878 [11.18%]
 * Battle Royale Day 3 --- Outlasted Sephiroth, 22810 [16.83%] - 22754 [16.79%]
 * Battle Royale Day 4 --- Lost to Cloud, 29733 [19.64%] - 54057 [35.71%]

Regardless of any result in this contest, Snake stole the show with his earlier than expected Smash Brothers Brawl boost. He completely embarrassed the main bracket, only lost to Samus because of Nintendo SFF, got his revenge on her and then some in the Battle Royale, then outlasted Sephiroth and placed third in the BR just for kicks. It was aided by a very phony final update on the BR's third day, but the end result is that Snake just earned himself one of the highest upsides of any elite character in these contests. Assuming Samus is booted from the main bracket come to next character battle, Snake is the clear favorite to win the next contest.

Summer 2007 Contest - Division 7 - Third Group
 * Division 7 Round 1 --- 1st place, 73706 [57.88%] - Nightmare, 28609 [22.47%] - Vyse, 13380 [10.51%] - Rayman, 11649 [9.15%]
 * Division 7 Round 2 --- 1st place, 60407 [47.72%] - Riku, 24596 [19.43%] - Ryu Hayabusa, 23942 [18.91%] - Nightmare, 17654 [13.94%]
 * Division 7 Final --- 1st place, 46201 [32.44%] - L-Block, 40744 [28.63%] - Kratos, 29772 [20.91%] - Riku, 25656 [18.02%]
 * Contest Quarterfinal --- 2nd place, 44489 [28.86%] - L-Block, 44753 [29.03%] - Sonic the Hedgehog, 33339 [21.63%] - Squall Leonhart, 31584 [20.49%]
 * Contest Semifinal --- 2nd place, 43081 [26.20%] - L-Block, 56925 [34.63%] - Master Chief, 39515 [24.04%] - Dante Sparda, 24880 [15.13%]
 * Contest Final --- 4th place, 23964 [12.27%] - L-Block, 65462 [33.51%] - Link, 58100 [29.74%] - Cloud Strife, 47834 [24.49%]

A very successful contest for Solid Snake was overshadowed by the fact that he spent four of those matches paired up with the L-Block. He made it to the finals of the contest for the second straight year, something only Cloud or Link can boast about. Snake was also involved in one of the best matches of the contest, as he duked it out with L-Block for first place while Sonic and Squall battled for third place, which also featured some of the best match pictures we've ever seen. One of the little ironic moments for me is that the only time Snake placed ahead of L-Block was when he had his infamously horrible sprite.