Can't Beat Air Man! / Air Man ga Taosenai

About

Air Man ga Taosenai (エアーマンが倒せない; lit. Can’t Beat Air Man) is a Japanese doujin song that describes the frustration the player feels when trying to defeat the boss Air Man on the Mega Man game, Mega Man 2. The song managed to reach massive popularity on the Japanese net after a vocal mix was released during 2007, inspiring a series of remixes and musical tributes on Nico Nico Douga (NND).

Origin

The first version of the song was created by NND user Seramikarutitan^[2], or Sera for short, and was uploaded to the video sharing site on May 26th, 2007. Originally a guitar composition, the MIDI karaoke-style video featured lyrics describing the player’s inability to defeat Air Man, so he can make it through the Heat Man stage on Mega Man 2, while featuring Mega Man dancing and mouthing the lyrics. The video was well-received with users on the site, helping the song to gain over 380,000 views as March 2013.

Mega Man 2

Originally released in Japan for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) on December 1988, Mega Man 2^[4], also known as “Rockman 2: The Mystery of Dr. Wily” was the second installment in the Mega Man series, developed by Capcom. Universally considered to be superior to the first game, the game was both a critical and financial success. The gameplay of the series is based around making your way through a number of Robot Master’s lairs, before taking down Dr. Wily himself at the end in a boss fight.

Spread

A week later, on June 1st, the doujin group Team Nekokan (Team.ねこかん[猫]), the same team behind “”http:" />No Sleep Until Clear", released an extended vocalized version of Sera’s song to their official site and to Youtube^[1], but it has since been taken down. In a collaboration with the groups SoundCYCLONE and Scinicade, the song featured additional lyrics and an flash animated video, which involves Mega Man finding a way to defeat Air Man, but ends up finding difficulty when battling Wood Man, before giving up and goes back to battle Air Man again. A month later, the video would be reprinted to NND^[3] and back to Youtube (shown below) on July 1st.

Team Nekokan’s vocal arrangement would help the song to gain massive amount of attention with Japanese users, due to its higher quality, extended lyrics and vocals, and it’s animated video. In just three years, Team Nekokan’s video would generate over 4.4 million views on NND and over 10 million views on Youtube. Soon after, the song would later be distributed, along with an acoustic remix, on a CD (shown below) at the 72nd Comiket convention on August 2007.

The well-known status of the song has since been cemented on Nico Nico Douga, with its multiple inclusions in the Kumikyoku Nico Nico Douga medleys^[5], along with another Mega Man song, Okksuenman, when the medleys were first being created on 2007. The song has also been included in compilation album titled “Nico Nico Douga Selection: CD de Kiite Mite.”^[6] (“Try to Listen to the CD.”), which featured songs that also became popular on the site.

Notable Examples

Many instrumental covers, parodies, and remixes has since been created after its release, with more then 3,000 videos relating to the song can be found on the Nico Nico Douga.^[7]

Left: Guitar Cover^[8] | Right: Ruler Cover^[9]

Left: Piano Cover | Right: OS Sound Effect Remixes^[10]

Search Interest

Search terms for the English translated version of the title fail to receive any results, with the most noticeable searches being for the original Japanese title.

External References

Editor’s Note: Registration is needed to browse the original videos listed in this section.