Snake is only really useful for casual speedrunning because it can trigger specific bombs in Sacred Grounds room 3 through walls (which, to be clear, may be beneficial if you really aren’t good at holding back cherubim, but requires better execution/missile usage for Ballos)
This game came to me after having played Gunstar Superheroes…I think at the same time I found Lyle in Cube Sector. I remember being charmed but not convinced and that’s where I like to live. I made no progress whatsoever because it did not fit into the DOS gaming framework that I approach most games on a PC from. I don’t enjoy being forced into any collectively approved aesthetic of whimsy or ‘story-book’ but Cave Story got into that groove for me, back when I was making an electron drift trajectory through my own Ruby Quartz version of a mathematics degree.