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  • AdventureQuest milks this trope for all it's worth.
    • With no exception, whenever you come across an opponent that looks small and cute, you'd better be prepared for a long, horrible, grueling and deadly fight. The dialogue in the game is rife with enemy descriptions saying, "this little creature looks harmless at first..." whereupon it proceeds to shred and/or cremate your ass big time. In fact, small creatures in this game are usually much, much tougher than most of the big and scary opponents due to the fact that they are usually given incredibly high evasion stats. Basically, if you come across an enemy with the word "dragon" in its name that takes up the entire other half of the screen, you'll probably breathe easy once you get used to the fact that big creatures in the game are generally fairly doable opponents. However, you'll groan whenever you encounter something tiny and cute-looking, because it's likely that the cute little "bun bit" you're fighting is going to be about three times as difficult to face as the previous so-called "behemoth".
    • And then we have Sally, the Supreme Necromantress of the Tower of Necromancy, in AdventureQuest Worlds. Sure, she may be a little girl, but she brought back Noxus as a lich and even helped create Hero Killer Vordred.
  • All Alone With Mannie: Mannie is a cute-looking anthropomorphic mouse girl with a body covered in Scary Stitches and out to kill you.
  • Arcanum:
    • The most powerful nature summon is an ordinary white rabbit. And by "ordinary" we mean that it's called a vorpal bunny. It is level 50 (with level cap being 55) and can be summoned at level 5 with right character. At this level (and for the most of the game) it tends to invoke Chunky Salsa Rule in a single bite. And you can have several of them. And they gain levels if you don't unsummon them.
    • Also in Arcanum is the Stillwater Giant, a brutal and deadly monster whose default form is a small blue rabbit. Even if he loses to the above in one combat round.
  • In the MMORPG Asheron's Call, the second most powerful monster in the entire game was the level-666 White Rabbit, nicknamed "Pookie" by players. It was not uncommon for Pookie to slaughter entire parties of high-level characters using spells such as "Bunny Smite".
  • Isadora from Atlas Reactor is a child-sized hamster with an IQ of 6,000, a desire for world domination, and a Death Ray. Other (if not quite as ludicrous) examples from the same game include the toy robot with military laser weaponry (Oz), the Robot Dog mascot with stealth and shapeshifting abilities (PuP) and the eternally happy Energy Being who can reduce people to their component atoms (Quark).
  • In Baldur's Gate II: Throne of Bhaal, you can meet a chinchilla (using a rabbit model) who happens to be a Bhaalspawn demigod, just like the PC. This means that not only can she talk, but move unnaturally fast, cast high-level spells, and shift into a humanoid form with the statistics of a wolfwere.
  • Baldur's Gate III: There's a small frog living in the swamps found in the southern reaches of Act 1. It's health is pitiful, but antagonize it at your own peril because it packs a terrifying punch delivered through various poison attacks. It casts Blur on itself the moment the fight starts, and its tiny size make it very hard to hit. To top it all off, its mucus can inflict madness on your party members to get them to attack each other. It's not uncommon to watch players experience a Total Party Kill to a squeaking amphibian that even the smallest and least imposing member could feasibly squash under their boot heel. Conversing with the frog via the "Speak with Animals" spell has the frog squeak out a pained, ominous warning about Auntie Ethel, the hag who lives in the swamp and possibly the person who made the poor bastard the way he is.
  • In the Terra Tubes of Battletoads, there are enemies that look like rubber ducks. Not only are they vicious menaces, they cannot be killed, only stunned.
    • Similarly, in the Ice Cavern, there are Snowmen who throw snowballs at you for one damage... but get take too long killing them and they knock you out with one punch. Not as nasty as the Rubber Duckies, but then it's not quite as cute either.
  • BlazBlue:
    • Jubei is a traditional nekomata, appearing in the form of a two-tailed cat that stands upright on its hind legs. He also happens to be one of the Six Heroes, carries the Nox Nyctores Mucro Somnio: Musashi, which has the power to cut that which cannot be cut, and is stated to be the most powerful living creature in existence. To give you an idea how strong he is, he single-handedly blocked a punch thrown by Iron Tager. Tager outweighs Jubei by about a ton.
    • Rachel is, to all appearances, a little girl dressed in an Elegant Gothic Lolita dress with her long, long hair tied up with a pair of ribbons that look remarkably like rabbit ears. ("Rabbit" is even her In-Series Nickname.) She is also the heir of the Alucard vampire clan; the wielder of the Tsukuyomi Unit, which grants her immense magical powers; is an Observer with tens of thousands of years worth of experience and is so far above everyone else that she doesn't really bother to fight people when she fights them, instead letting her familiars do all the work for her... She doesn't even ever get hit when she's "hit"; she just pulls one of her familiars into the way of the attack and uses them as living shields.
  • Bloodborne: Aww, look at how FAT the giant ravens have gotten! They'd be much more menacing if they weren't so morbidly obese that they waddle on the gr— AUGH They can still fly! Run from the swarm!
    • Also, the Celestials are these giant-headed alien dwarves that have barely any combat skills and few hit points. But if they're far away and know SPELLS, get ready to die from artillery overkill.
  • A rare example of a Killer Rabbit that is on your side can be found in Bloons TD 6. The hero Geraldo will start stocking pet rabbits in his shop at level 10. By default, they seem to be purely aesthetic, but upon buying four of them at once, they all merge into a larger rabbit... A larger rabbit that begins to shred the opposing Bloons with frighteningly good ease. With 40 damage, 10 pierce, a splash attack, and being able to attack bloons outside of Geraldo's range, through solid walls, can target camo bloons with no assistance, damages Lead bloons, and doesn't even take up space on the map for other towers, Geraldo's rabbits are a force to be reckoned with. The large rabbit they merge into is even known as the Killer Rabbit internally!
  • In Boiling Point: Road to Hell, the helpless grannies sitting by the road are liable to start throwing grenades if you massacre civilians.
  • Braid: Killer Rabbits squared. Or cubed. Not only are these rabbits vicious, but they initially disguise themselves as flowers and sound like cats. No matter what you find cute and charming, there's a good chance Braid's rabbits will undermine it.
  • The Bunny Invasion series is made of this trope. It features a man named Mr. Frost going up against a horde of homicidal bunnies led by the Bunny Queen...or in the Easter Special's case the Easter Bunny.
  • Candy Mountain Massacre: Just about all the monsters, but the most literal examples are the bunnies, one of the fastest enemies of the game. They will cheerfully run up to you (either alone or in packs) and clobber you senseless within moments.
  • Cave Story:
    • The Mimigas, friendly anthropomorphic rabbits that are your main allies throughout the game. But, give a Mimiga a red flower to eat, and... they enter a "frenzied" state, which means they mutate into horrific, bloodthirsty, mindless monsters that simply kill and kill and kill until they die. Even the weakest Mimiga becomes powerful enough to be an early-game boss in this form. The Mimigas are aware of this power, but only use it as an absolute last resort.
    • And then there's an optional late game boss, Ma Pignon, which is a small, smiling blue mushroom. A smiling blue mushroom that begins rocketing around the room hard enough to cause landslides to fall from the ceiling.
  • Commander Keen 4:
    • The game features an enemy that looks like a teeny-tiny green ball (described as a plant in the manual). Approach it and a gigantic mouth extends from it, killing you instantly — although if you know what you're doing, you can paralyze it in the split-second that it takes for the mouth to reach you.
    • There are actual deadly living rocks in the game, and plenty other creatures that look either goofy or cute, but can kill you with a mere (venomous) touch. Or by breathing fire. Or pushing you into a death trap. Or gobbling you up.
  • In Cross Edge, in certain dungeons, you have a chance to run into the cutest little pink dragon ever. This cute little dragon, Lujit, also happens to be stronger than the Big Bad, capable of the Big Bad's greatest attack — A-Fear — as well as Angelic Howl and Earthquake, and hits so unbelievably hard you'd swear someone high up has it out for you. And lets not even go into the immeasurable power wielded by its more powerful brother, Cilone.
  • In Dark Cloud 2, Dark Emperor Griffon's true form is that of an adorably cute bunny person. Even the protagonists are surprised. But then the boss battle starts, his true skill as a master mage surfaces, and the infinite power of his Cosmic Keystone shines forth. Hint: Max and Monica embody the Earth and Moon in their Atlamillia. Their foe wields the Sun.
  • The Basilisks in Dark Souls, which look like deformed frogs with cartoonishly huge eyes. Your first thought will probably be that they look either hilariously stupid or adorable. That being said, since this is Dark Souls, they're incredibly dangerous and will slap you with the dreaded Curse status ailment, which instakills you and cuts your life bar in half until you scrounge up enough souls for a Purging Stone.
    • Rats! Okay, the rats in Dark Souls are disgustingly large and ugly, but come on; rats are a standard RPG mook and could never be considered a threat, right? Wrong. Prepare to get poisoned and staggered a lot.
    • A rare enemy in the game is a Mushroom Man with stumpy legs and arms. The "child" mushrooms are adorable, tripping over their own feet and generally being easy to kill. The "adult" mushrooms don't look any different (except they're bigger), so many players make the mistake of letting their guard down around them. Bad idea, since the adult mushrooms have a massive amount of health and a punch that is way more powerful than it has any right to be. On the plus side, they drop Gold Pine Resin, which gives 150 lightning damage to many weapons.
  • Dark Souls II has the undead pigs in Majula. Tiny, cute... and they will beat the crap out of any player stupid enough to disturb them. They have a ridiculously high amount of HP, do decent damage with their attacks, and will chase you to the ends of the earth (which is actually a good thing, as it's required for one extremely obtuse puzzle). Once the player gets some decent equipment and levels up a few times, they aren't so dangerous, but they're usually encountered by newbies who have barely started out.
  • The Dark Spire features Killer Rabbits. Ok, bunnies. Close enough. Subversion in that they are not only not that dangerous but are the least dangerous enemies on any floors they appear.
  • Sara's familiar in Demon Front is a flying rabbit-like Ridiculously Cute Critter named Bunny, who despite looking adorable, can fire exploding bubbles that deals massive damage on enemies and is invincible to boot.
  • Goats are found aplenty in Desktop Dungeons, being one of the weaker enemy types. Their boss versions are a different story. For example, Gharbad the- whoah!, doesn't have a lot of HP, but his base attack is a gigantic, 255, which takes it impossible to survive without indirect damage spells, tons of physical resistance, or Death Protection.
  • If you think about it, the Sparda family in Devil May Cry is a family of Pintsized Powerhouse Killer Rabbits for other demons, looking a lot like humans until they are attacked and survive mortal wounds as if it was nothing, dash under their legs and slice them repeatedly to death. And they even can Devil Trigger. Of course, we can't say much about Sparda himself, but most of this is because Dante, Vergil, and Nero are Weak, but Skilled. Trish and Lucia also could qualify. Then there's Lady...
  • Anything from Whimsyshire in Diablo III. Cute little flowers, stuffed bears, and colourful ponies... all of which are stronger than the end-of-game enemies.
  • Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga has the Killer Bunny, which appears if you kill enough bunnies. It has huge fangs and blood-mottled white fur, and is level 22. A particularly sadistic player can encounter it very early when they're likely dangerously underleveled, and score a massive XP reward... or, more likely, a brutal death. There's a special achievement for killing it, too.
  • Dragon Age:
    • Deepstalkers from Dragon Age: Origins are surprisingly cute for a bunch of flesh-eating, poison-spitting, lamprey-faced compies that burst from the ground in the dozens hoping to tear you limb from limb.
    • The baby dragons are almost too adorable to kill.
    • And in Awakening, Anders tells the tale of his pet cat back in the Circle Tower, Mr. Wiggums, who was possessed by a rage demon and killed three templars.
    • A long-standing joke, even with the creative staff is that your pet Mabari's name actually is Rabbit.
    • A farmer in Dragon Age: Inquisition asks you to find his family's ram, Lord Woolsley. If the player attacks it for whatever reason, it reveals itself as a rage demon and attacks. The journal then says that the farmer can never know the terrible truth.
  • The "B path" boss of the lost woods of Dragon's Crown, as a Shout-Out to Monty Python and the Holy Grail. It looks like an ordinary white rabbit, but can deal a surprisingly high amount of damage and it even can break your skull in a One-Hit Kill. You can use bombs to deliver heavy damage and quickly defeat the boss, much like how the movie's rabbit is killed with the Holy Hand Grenade.
  • Dragon Quest:
    • The slimes. Most of them actually aren't that dangerous, but given how incredibly adorable and harmless they look, it doesn't take a lot for them to be much more dangerous than they look. Tell me you'd think this could do any harm.
    • They're far from the only cuddly-looking killers in the series, though. Quite possibly the best example would have to be the Sanguini family, which are cute little baby demons. So cute, that one optional quest has you fulfilling the request of a warrior who is smitten with them to deliver each type a scarf. Awwwwwwwwww. That said, aside from wasting turns "fluffing around", they can be dangerous. It's pointed out in the Flavor Text that Manguinies, the genuine, demonic looking...demons, are the result of a Sanguini that has drank enough blood.
  • Drakengard 3 has Zero's Flower. It doesn't do much during the various routes apart from eventually turning every Intoner into a Grotesquerie Queen, the biggest threat in the Drakengard world.
  • Dubloon features Fire Ants. These small ants may and will burn you to crisp if you don't act quick. There also literal killer bunnies, but they are Obviously Evil.
  • The simple dogs in early Dungeons & Dragons Online levels are surprisingly dangerous in Elite difficulty. You'd think a swarm of small reptilian pikemen or a brigand with armor and a mace or even a troglodyte shaman who stinks so badly his stink can weaken you and who can cast spells would be bigger threats than the mutts, but a combination of surprisingly high HP, ability to hit like a truck and to make trip attacks means a pack of 4 dogs can be a surprisingly good reality check for an unprepared inexperienced party. Wolves too, for pretty much the same reasons, these cute furballs can seriously mess things up for an adventurer party at any level.
  • Dungeon Siege:
    • In the secret quest of the first game, you fight Killer Chickens.
    • In the secret quest of Dungeon Siege II, you fight Killer Prairie Dogs.
  • Dwarf Fortress has carp. It became a memetic fish — as in "Oh, carp!".
    Dwarf Fortress Wiki: [T]here is only one thing to do if you come across a river full of carp and you don't want your dwarves to die... Run. Run and never look back.
    Toady One: I think I made the fish too hardcore.*
    • The deadliness of carp stems from a quirk in how stats were trained up. In previous versions, any physical activity increased all physical stats — and carp were fish, so they were always swimming. That combined with being large enough to attack dwarves made them a deadly threat to any dwarf schmuck who wanted to do something in their rivers.
    • Carp have stepped down from this position in favor of giant sponges, which will kill your dwarves if they get close to it. Not bad for an animal who shouldn't be able to even move. This deadliest arises from two things about the sponge; firstly, due to having only one body part, it's effectively invincible to brute force (no organs to damage or limbs to sever). While it doesn't chase your dwarves down, if its located in a river, it's bound to cause mass job cancellations. The deadly part comes in when one realizes just how heavy giant sponges are; even with the pathetic push attack that a creature with no natural attacks receives, a giant sponge can easily shatter a dwarf's spine. If you ever encounter the elusive vampire giant sponge, which can not only move but can also leave the water, may the gods protect you.
    • Also, giant keas are rampaging homicidal kleptomaniacal psychopaths, in the form of parrots.
    • Due to a Noodle Incident in which one was used as an Improvised Weapon, fluffy wamblers are said to be the only natural enemy of bronze colossi.
    • Also, at least one fort has had an incident where a wild duck battled The Legions of Hell and defeated two demons by itself.
    • Elephants themselves have this status. In real life, elephants are animals who mind their own business and tend to shy from civilization unless necessary. In Dwarf Fortress however, elephants are insanely territorial, fear inducing death machines fueled only by their burning hatred of dwarves. Most famous in Boatmurdered.
  • EarthBound (1994) brings us the Clumsy Robot, whose combat actions include sweeping up dustbunnies, picking up nuts and bolts that jiggled loose from its body, eating bologna sandwiches, accidentally firing party-devastating beams and missiles while tripping over its own two feet and being completely unkillable by all normal forms of attack. The party eventually has to be bailed out by the Runaway Five... who simply run in while it's distracted and turn it off.
  • Earthworm Jim:
    • There is a part in the level "Down The Tubes" where you ride on top of a huge hamster that can eat pretty much anything. And that's the least of the harmless-looking things in Earthworm Jim that can beat you to a bloody pulp.
    • On that same level are small red creatures about half the size of Jim that resist gunfire and if he approaches too close, they slam him against the ground.
    • In a later level, a slime-dwelling creature dwells at the bottom of a massive chasm that looks like a little tan balloon with a smile unless you get too close to it. If you do, it will swiftly start to resemble a tyrannosaur.
    • Then, of course, there's quite possibly the reigning king of this trope (screw seniority) Peter Puppy. A little, pink puppy who, if he gets hurt, changes into a massive, purple, spikey monster with lots of teeth and drains a third of your heath as it literally chews you up and spits you out.
  • Elona has many instances:
    • Bells are Metal Slime monsters who will drop a lot of precious items if you manage to defeat them before they run away (and given that they take 5-8 turns in the time it takes a mid-level player to take one, that is more than likely). If you manage in the even harder task of capturing one, you can give them a ranged weapon, and watch as they utterly slaughter any monster with an endless stream of arrows/bullets, and dodge pretty much everything foes throw at them. And you can experiment on them with the Gene Engineer skill to give them melee weapons as well...
    • The Little Girl is one of the first companions you'll get. She can wield heavy weapons like nobody's business, and evolve into the Valkyrie, a version of herself with a tiny armor and wings, and much more bruising potential.
    • After defeating Zeome, the Final Boss of Elona, you meet Orphe the Chaos Child, a small and innocent-looking kid...who just happens to be the Final Boss of the expansion, Elona+.
  • In Enchanted Arms, the golem APO looks like a couple of gumdrops with small, cartoon arms and legs. No, really. It's one of the most devastatingly-effective golems in the game.
  • Epic Battle Fantasy 5:
    • One of the twelve Arcade minibosses is PUMPKUS, an 8-bit pumpkin monster with a big-eyed smile on its face. Hitting it will enrage it, where it still looks cute, but its stats boost to the point where it has the hands-down highest base damage out of any enemy in the entire series,note  powerful enough to oneshot all three frontline members of the party. The key is to calm it down by healing it with Water or Bio elemental attacks at the end of the party's turn, so that it will attack in its weaker, happy state.
    • The Slime Bunny is normally completely harmless to the party, with its attacks healing them on any difficulty, and providing no assistance to other foes unless you're playing on Hard or Epic difficulty. Turn on the Counter-Attacking Foes Challenge, however, and it will counter attacks by casting Genesis, a Holy elemental Limit Break. Inflicting Syphon will prevent this, as does capturing or killing it.
  • EVE Online has a few ships that are much more deadly than they seem, but the most infamous of all is the Rorqual. This ship is intended as a capital sized mining support ship, and essentially sits still in space while others unload ore into it. However it can tank over a million EHP and do over a thousand DPS with its drones with a combat loadout. This is impressive on its own, but to make matters for those unlucky enough to attack it worse, it is often used as a bait ship. Expect a wave of reinforcements to warp in as soon as the Rorqual has you warp scrambled.
  • In the MMORPG EverQuest there are certain fish considered sacred by a god. A god who sometimes poses as one of the fish. Attack them at your extreme peril.
  • E.V.O.: Search for Eden: A literal example. The rabbit evolution parts are comically overpowered.
  • In Fable II, one of the contestants in the Crucible waiting room is Gorgoron, a cute little girl with a deep, menacing voice who claims to be a shape-shifter and master of disguise.
  • Fallen London:
    • Might stretch the definition of cute for some, but they definitely seem a lot more harmless than they actually are: Rattus Faber, a race of intelligent rats that lives in the underground. Very intelligent rats with impressive fighting skill, a knack for tactics and gunsmithing humans could only dream of. A Rattus Faber infestation usually requires an all-out war to dislodge from a building, and their gangs can become a bigger threat than the usual human bandits.
    • The Pre-emptive Guinea Pig, an actual guinea pig, though one that's intelligent, speaks and wears Conquistador-like armor. You equip them like a weapon, and they're exceptionally good at this role, boosting your fighting skill about as much as a Hand Cannon made by the aforementioned rats. "Go for the eyes!" battlecries optional.
      • Notably, in Sunless Sea you can come across an island where factions of the two species are at war. You must back one of the two sides, but post-victory you can succeed in forging an alliance that leads to a united republic/kingdom that can stand on its own as a minor power in the Unterzee.
  • Fallout: New Vegas, the tiny deathclaw is actually a miniature version of the LEGENDARY DEATHCLAW! HP and Damage included.
    • Let us not forget the 'Legendary Bloatfly', the wimpiest critter in the wasteland mutated to insane levels of power who can slaughter all but the toughest characters in one or two hits.
  • Fishgun is a game where fruits have come to life, and are trying to kill you. The last and most difficult boss? A strawberry the size of a building who keeps trying to chomp you down.
  • Fantastic Dizzy has cute little snails. Yes, snails. These loveable, unkillable, little geranium-munching monsters are really good at chipping away at your health normally, but if you drop from any ledge on the right-hand side of Dizzy's village you risk the humiliation of being stripped of your entire health bar in moments as one cheerfully and aimlessly wanders past Dizzy while he is stunned. Do not mess with the snails.
  • Fantasy Quest offers a giant bunny rabbit that proves surprisingly lethal. The sequel kicks it up a notch with a herd of carnivorous giraffes.
  • In Far Cry 4, one of the rare animal hunting missions is of a legendary albino honey badger named Gulo. Rumour has it that he's immortal, but your hunting contact brushes it off as superstition. When you attempt to begin the hunt, the game asks if you have a death wish before allowing you to continue, and when you arrive at the hunting area carcasses and skeletons of wolves, a tiger, a rhino, and several human soldiers litter the ground. Gulo can deplete your entire health bar in one bite and can soak up an entire magazine of SMG bullets.
  • Final Fantasy:
    • The Tonberry and all its variations in the series. Tiny. Strangely cute. Its first moves are to walk slowly towards one of the heroes, until it gets close enough, and... doink. Then you start taking it seriously. Yeah you see that thing it's carrying that looks like a garden spade? That's not a spade, that's not a spade at all!
      • Lampshaded by Legendary Frog, when Cloud thinks that he can take on the cute little Tonberry, despite the Narrator's warnings telling him that this would be a good time to use the "Run Away" option.
      • Lampshaded in-series in Final Fantasy XIII, when a Tonberry killsteals an Undying Cie'th you were sent after.
      • The Tonberry (normally encountered alone) is so dangerous that, when facing three of them in Final Fantasy VI, they are actually classified as a different creature labelled "Tonberries", just so you know what you have gotten yourself into.
      • Final Fantasy X takes this up to eleven with the Don Tonberry Monster Arena fight. Considerably less threatening-looking than the other behemoths and all powerful creatures you can fight from this sidequest, and usually far more deadly. It can not only stab you to an instant kill once it gets close enough, but has a unique counterattack that scales in damage to how many enemies the character has killed throughout the game. Even a below-average kill count will quite easily reach enough to one shot you from full health unless you have the Awesome, but Impractical Break HP Cap equipped, and even that may only stop one of the counterattacks.
      • Kurasame Susaya in Final Fantasy Type-0 has a Tonberry as a pet, nicknamed the "Reaper's Right Hand". This one is on the player's side as a Guest-Star Party Member if Kurasame isn't available for Support Personnel*. Tonberry comes equipped with the biggest knife he could find, two anti-One-Hit Kill accessories*, Death Grudge, Thundaga SHG-II, and Curaga, and can killsteal an MA boss if you let him (read: don't kill it first).
      • World of Final Fantasy has Master Tonberry, who runs the largely-optional Coliseum. Rank Scales with Asskicking is in full effect. There are also paleberries, which look like albino tonberries, and baby versions of both types, which can actually be more dangerous than grown tonberries by virtue of the grown tonberries not having a Grudge attack.
      • Final Fantasy XV has its own Master Tonberry slowly walking around. Of course, players new to the series would think that the high mobility combat style of the game would mean that such an enemy would be an easy target for hit-and-run approaches and ambush him. They are promptly surprised when he then pulls out a lightsaber three times his size and starts flipping around like Yoda. At that point the "run" portion becomes more a matter of survival then a strategy.
    • Also apropos to this, Final Fantasy XI features a number of cute-but-deadly monsters, including rabbits, composing families with level tiers reaching up to very high levels in most cases. Rabbits are one of the more powerful mob-families in general, leading to the saying: "No matter how powerful you are, somewhere in the world there is a rabbit that can kick your ass."
      • The cute fluffy and peaceful animals are also quite frequently the most dangerous mobs in a region otherwise populated by undead horrors and other things that at least look threatening. As new players get told, never anger the cute little things or you'll find out why the scary big monsters would rather fight you than them.
    • From the same game, the Tarutaru race are adorably short and cute; with adorable pointed ears and button noses to boot. They're every bit as powerful as any other player race, though, and especially skilled in magic. Of particular note is NPC Professor Shantotto, who flat-out scares a good number of the heroes and villains in Dissidia Final Fantasy.
    • The Lalafel from Final Fantasy XIV, that game's answer to the Tarutaru, are short, chubby humanoids who are nevertheless capable of being powerful warriors and mages.
    • Mog from Final Fantasy VI can do quite a bit of damage with his dances. This ad for the SNES version of the game is a bit of an exaggeration, but just a bit...
    • Final Fantasy XII has several classes of cutesy enemies, including mandragoras, onions, cacti, and the insanely fast and surprisingly powerful Dreamhares, who actually look like rabbits. The cute enemies your party encounters early in the game generally will not attack unless you attack them first, but later versions are more hostile and can inflict lots of nasty status effects. The king of them all is Fury, a cute little boss bunny who lives in the Necrohol of Nabudis. There's also one literally called the Vorpal Bunny. It's a rare hunting Mark, meaning it's not QUITE as tough as Fury is, but still nothing to underestimate.
      • There is also a sequence where the player must alert a troup of dancing moogles that their seeq boss plans to sell them. The moogles respond to this revelation by beating their boss to within an inch of his life, which gives the party the opening they need to sneak into Archades.
    • The bunnies (okay, "Dreamhares") in Final Fantasy Tactics A2 aren't all that killer—they can mind-control your allies, but they're easily set on fire. In one mission, however, you encounter a slightly odd-looking variant of the species deep underground, and one of your moogle allies shakes in fear at the sight of it. Turns out it's a "Mooglebane," named for its favorite food. Fury, mentioned above, also makes a reappearance in this game.
    • Cactuars. They look like cute little cactus people. But they have a Fixed Damage Attack that can deal 1,000 damage, no matter what. Even worse is that some games have a second version that can do 10,000 damage, more than the normal HP cap, meaning instant death to anything it hits.
    • In Final Fantasy V, there's a cave where you are attacked by "nut eaters" — squirrel monsters, who are not very dangerous, having only 1 hit point each... but frequently, you'll run into a "skull eater" instead, which looks identical (except for being black) and who is powerful enough to kill your whole party! (Ironically, it still only has one hit point, so if you manage to penetrate its defense, it goes down in one hit.) Not to mention that if you try to use magic against it, not only will it not work, but you'll now be faced with five of them! The Updated Re-release introduced another Palette Swap in the Bonus Dungeon, called Soul Eater. However, this one is more like a Demonic Spider, nasty but doable without special tricks.
    • Chocobos can take you to school too. Not so surprising really, with those big clawed feet.
      • In Final Fantasy X-2, they usually run away if encountered in battle until you activate a sidequest that allows you to catch it for your ranch. If it doesn't, however, prepare for a battle, as its kicks are powerful and it can cast its own version of Meteor. In International/HD Remaster versions it can learn Meteor naturally at level 40, and the ones in Cocobo Cup also know Mighty Guard, Hastega, Fireworks, Black Sky and Heartless Attack which can make short work of your team if you're not prepared.
      • Exaggerated in Final Fantasy XIII with Sazh's pet baby chocobo, who is not only insanely intelligent, but takes out an armed soldier by itself.
      • In XIII-2, Serah can recruit monsters to serve as third-slot party members in her Paradigm Pack. Chocobos are some of the best party members she can have; Yellow, Red, and Gold are Commandos, Blue is a Ravager, Silver is a Sentinel, Black is a Saboteur, Purple is a Synergist, and White and Green are Medics.
    • The Red Chocobo in Final Fantasy Tactics can do all the things a normal chocobo can do, and of course, summon a fiery meteor of death. When they showed up in Final Fantasy XIV for the Return to Ivalice raids they became a meme for how many people have wiped to those meteors.
    • Final Fantasy IX: Yan. They're so adorable... but they're the strongest monsters in the game, and can easily take out a full party in seconds with Comet, which they will take full advantage of, Virus Power, which will prevent the afflicted from gaining any EXP you get in the battle, and has Float/Snort combo, which blows away one of your party members and counts them as Dead.
  • The Manaketes in the Fire Emblem series are often of this nature, the majority of them taking the form of young girls while not in combat, but possessing incredible combat prowess once they show their true colors. Otherwise characters like Est (Shadow Dragons and the Blade of Light/Mystery of the Emblem/Shadow Dragon) and Nino (Fire Emblem) are Magikarp Power housed and fit this trope too.
    • Fire Emblem: The Binding Blade's Fae is a particular case because even in her dragon form she still retains a cute appearance, she is still incredible powerful.
    • One exception: Mist from Path of Radiance. She looks no more than a petite 13, can't fight until she gets a class change, and then deals substandard damage. Not quite as young or ineffective in Radiant Dawn, but still unimpressive. She's far from ineffective though, although it takes a bit of work and luck, she can be capable of almost soloing whole maps thanks to her high luck.
    • Fire Emblem: Awakening features the taguel, a class of shapeshifters that turn into literal Killer Rabbits. 15 foot tall killer rabbits with massive teeth and huge claws.
    • Annette from Fire Emblem: Three Houses is one of the smallest characters pre- and post-timeskip, and pre-timeskip, could easily be mistaken for a small child. In your first proper mission with the Blue Lions (where you actually kill enemies instead of knocking them out), she's surprisingly at ease with killing people, instead happily commenting on how well her magic is coming along, whereas the more seasoned Dimitri has a more somber and regretful attitude towards it. In her B-support with Mercedes, she's also shown to have zero issues with threatening people if they hurt her friends.
  • The Five Nights at Freddy's series is built around these, twisting child-friendly mascots into homicidal machines. It actually has a literal example in Bonnie the Bunny, a relentless attacker who makes up for the low danger level of his assaults with the sheer quantity of said assaults.
    • 1 has four animatronic mascots who are cartoonish animals and the restaurant's main attraction. At night, the animatronics will wander around the restaurant, and when they find the night watch, they'll stuff him in a Freddy suit filled with metallic parts.
    • 2 has a new set of even cuter mascots who are no less kill-happy, along with the old mascots, who are far more broken-down and disturbing this time around.
    • 3 only features Springtrap, who averts the trope by being a ghoulish metal rabbit designed to scare people. It also features "hallucinations" that are horrifying burn-scarred versions of the previous two games' animatronics.
    • The spinoff World, on the other hand, has a talking, goofy-eyed, buck toothed rainbow... that is secretly a murderous jerk who enjoys making fun of everyone she can.
  • With enough modification, Forza 3's 1964 Volkswagen Rabbit will eat Ferraris and Lamborghinis and crap them out as Yugos and Trabants.
  • This is pretty much the entire point behind the Gaia Online MMO zOMG! (Yes, that is actually the name). The basic plot is that relatively harmless inanimate objects such as garden gnomes, cotton balls, and cloves of garlic are somehow becoming animated. A literal case of Everything Trying to Kill You, if you will.
    • The result can be best summed up in a promotional poster featuring a musclebound, heavily armored orc trapped up a tree by a Lawn Gnome, "Cute? Cute never tried to eat your leg."
    • Not to mention those damn Cherry Fluffs, toward the beginning. After easily dispatching three other varieties of Fluffs, you might try your luck on one of these pink fluffy whatsits, only to have the entire thing blow up in your face.
    • Gaia's original Killer Rabbit, Grunny, is now piloting Humongous Mecha submarines in the last two areas.
    • Arguably, Frank. He's effectively a male Meganekko of the "shy sweet nerd" variety. And he's a Mad Scientist working with the Big Bad to destroy Gaia For Science!!
  • Galactic Civilizations has a race of evil space squirrels known as the Snathi, whose portrait is available to player empires. Some famous Let's Plays featured the "suspiciously rabbit-like" Spectres of Agony, who ate their enemies' eyeballs and ended up ascending to godhood, and their distant relatives, the Spatial Hares, who were supposed to be diplomatic and peaceful, and ended up destroying no less than 21 stars — making them the rabbits with the highest killcount on this page, measuring in the tens of billions.
  • Giana Sisters DS: Dragon Bunnies look like cute, pink bunnies until they open their massive, fanged maws and try to swallow Giana whole.
  • In Ginormo Sword, after expending a great amount of blood and sweat on defeating the very big and tough False God, you unlock an area where "a watchdog" reportedly resides in. So you go in there to find an adorable-looking dog/pig hybrid who's easily the tiniest out of the monsters you've encountered so far. Aww, how could this cute widdle puppy possibly be in a boss-marked arena? Then you swing your huge sword, and the puppy obliterates you with one blast of its equally huge fiery breath. Turns out its actual name is "Hellhound".
  • Baragon in the game Godzilla Unleashed certainly applies... even if he is a giant dinosaur-thing. Sure, he's the smallest monster in the entire game, and he is adorable in an odd sort of way, but he's more than able to take down his opponents including the biggest monster in the game, Biollante.
  • God Hand has Poison Chihuahuas.
  • Golden Sun:
  • Guardian Tales: One sidequest revolving around taking down one rabbit. While it looks to be easy, the bunny will kill you via a cutscene and sends you back. However, what revolves around taking down the rabbit revolves around using a holy grenade, as one other person states that the holy grenade is needed to kill the rabbit.
  • In the Guild Wars: Eye of the North expansion, the player can be lured by a cute little bunny into a small hollow filled with cute little bunnies... that then turn into a LOT of nasty Vaettir with a named boss in their midst. And in Nightfall, we have the beetles, basically spherical creatures that move by rolling around and make pretty cute noises. While the original beetles are a nuisance, the Madness titans later on can mess your party up.
  • In Gunstar Heroes, Minion Soldier has a good number of hitpoints for a Mini-Boss, but you might not expect it to be able to throw you given that it's about half your size.
  • Hades: One of the possible encounters in the Temple of Styx (if you're really unlucky) is an enhanced version of the Tiny Vermin known as the King Vermin which has the same model as the tiny rats but is an absolute monster Lightning Bruiser with boss-level HP (meaning that this is a rat as tough as a god) that also summons the poisonous Gigantic Vermin to its aid.
  • While headcrabs in Half-Life are generally not considered cute, with the possible exception of Lamarr, they fit this trope by being small, innocuous, apparently harmless, and by far the most horrific thing in the series, latching onto an unfortunate host and commandeering its nervous system to create a delightful monstrosity known as a headcrab zombie. And the Fast and Poison variants are even worse.
    • From Half Life Opposing Force there's the Spore Launcher weapon: An infantile alien soldier that spits explosive spores at your enemies. An absolutely adorable idle animation has Adrian petting it, which it happily accepts.
  • Hearts Like Clockwork: The Roombas, which are automatic vacuum machines that are shaped like harmless circles, turn hostile and attack Rin's party. Some variants of the Roombas can whip out buzzsaws, becoming more dangerous as a result. While they're individually not as strong as the tutorial Duel Bosses, they make up for it in numbers.
  • In, I Was a Teenage Exocolonist, some of the xenofauna of Vertumna look cute, but they're still vicious creatures:
    • Manticores are pink goopy-looking creatures, but their spikes and height make it abundantly clear that they're not on your side.
    • Hopeyes are cute little rabbit-kangaroo-mouse hybrids...and when their nests are threatened, can swarm to kill anyone who threatens them.
    • Vriki are small, adorable spider-like creatures with mushrooms growing on their heads and many tentacles, but while the babies mostly don't eat anything bigger than fruit and insects, they come in swarms and can devour you if you disturb them.
      Screw spiders, even cute ones.
  • The Precursors from the Jak and Daxter games, the most powerful beings in the universe, are revealed towards the end of Jak 3 to be Ottsels, just like Daxter. Ever wondered why you never saw one?
  • Baby O'Hara from Jitsu Squad is a rather literal example. She's an andromorphic rabbit-human, and a lightning-fast kunoichi who wields two kunai at once, capable of slicing and stabbing through enemies like no tomorrow, besides having a deadly Flechette Storm attack where she flings twenty projectiles into enemies' faces within seconds.
  • Kingdom Hearts:
    • Several of the weaker Heartless fall under this, especially the Shadows, which are the first type of Heartless that you encounter in the original game. They may be Made of Evil, but they're still adorable.
      • Wyverns too. Yes, they're man-sized dragons, but they're very cuddly-looking man-sized dragons.
      • And the Black Fungus enemies. They ARE cute, but they are hostile unlike their cousins, and have high defense.
    • And in the prequel game, Birth by Sleep, some of the Unversed may or may not qualify, but they also notably feature a literal Killer Rabbit amongst their ranks, called (amusingly enough) the Hareraiser, which is described as being "the anti-cuddly".
    • Pay the Pride Lands a visit in Kingdom Hearts II and Sora turns into one of these. A cute little lion cub who is more than capable of taking on all the Heartless the world can offer, including the effing ginormous Groundshaker.
    • Most of the Dream Eaters in KH3D fall under this, being stylized, colorful versions of real and mythological animals which more often then not look and sound adorable, but are no less capable of murdering you (or your enemies, for that matter) than the previous enemy types in the series. This applies more to the friendly Spirit Dream Eaters, as the evil Nightmares have red eyes and dark colors that make them look more threatening. Again, there are literal examples in the Me Me Bunny, a ridiculously cute rabbit Dream Eater that beats up its enemies with its ears, and its Palette Swap Majik Lapin, a Robe and Wizard Hat-wearing spell slinger.
      • In the plot, one Nightmare Me Me Bunny summoned by Musketeer Pete takes out Sora in just one hit. It even makes an adorable cry at the moment of the strike.
      • Special mention goes to Rare Nightmares, which have seemingly less threatening white color, but all of their stats are bumped up enormously. Notably Rare Ryu Dragon in Symphony of Sorcery will kill you dead even on lower difficulties.
  • Gameplay example in The King of Fighters. Hotaru seems harmless and in terms of personality but is a monster in the hands of a skilled player (and is generally high to top tier).
  • Kirby:
    • Kirby himself. Adorable little pink puffball with a black hole for a stomach that frequently trounces Eldritch Abominations.
    • Scarfy. Try to have Kirby inhale this cute little cat, and he gets ugly and chases you around until he explodes.
  • Trico from The Last Guardian. This adorable thing that makes you love it just from the trailer also managed to splatter an armored guard against a wall with a swing of its claw.
  • The MMO La Tale has so many of these that a good rule of thumb is "if it looks cute, run like hell." Especially annoying are the Prring Palette Swaps and Shaggies, which mob you and jump behind you to deliver devastating back attacks.
  • Any Yordle character in League of Legends would qualify for this trope, but easily one of the best examples would have to be Teemo, a huggably adorable little chipmunk-like boy scout who will pump you full of poison darts and trap you in a minefield of toxic mushrooms. Bonus points for his Cottontail skin, making him even more of a literal killer rabbit.
  • The Legend of Kyrandia series has the Kyrandian Killer Squirrels. In the third installment, Malcolm's Revenge, there's one on the very first screen — allowing you to produce one of the fastest Game Overs in video game history, simply by teasing the squirrel twice — at which point it'll leap at your face, kill you, and drag off your corpse to feed its young.
  • The Cuccos in The Legend of Zelda games are perfectly harmless chickens for the most part. If attacked, though they are clearly being hit and react with distress, they suffer no ill effect. If attacked persistently, the Cucco will begin to hit back, and an endless swarm of other, equally invulnerable Cuccos will come to its aid, pursuing the player and attempting to peck him to death.
    • Their chicks are also masters of deception. In The Minish Cap, the bouncing yellow babies with their cute chirping noises appear to be completely harmless. That is, until you turn Minish-sized and enter Anju's house, where about fifteen or twenty chicks will take notice of you and chase you around in an attempt to eat you. So, essentially, this makes Link... a chick magnet.
    • In the same game, there are cats that are normally friendly when you are normal-sized, but some of them swipe at you viciously when Minish-sized. Oddly, you can talk to them, and even Kinstone fuse with some of them (even the ones that attack you).
    • In The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker, Pigs have taken on the role Cuccos had in previous titles. In particular, there is a black pig that you can give to a family near the beginning of the game. When you come back to your home island, it will have grown huge. It is possible to jump in the pen and attack it until it becomes hostile, but this is a very bad idea. It will cause three hearts of damage when it hits you, which is more than any enemy in the game can do, you can't block it, and it will keep ramming you until you jump out of the pen.
    • In The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, they've got those little cat-raccoon-pet-things in Skyloft called Remlits. During the day they meow, follow you around, and look absolutely adorable with those huge Bambi-eyes. During the night, they're actively trying to rip your guts out. This is actually because they've been corrupted by a demon. Turning the demon human causes the Remlits to retain their much nicer natures at all hours of the day.
    • Cuccos return in Hyrule Warriors more dangerous than ever before. If two cuccos get into a fight in one of your bases and are left alone, one will eventually defeat the other, conquer your base, and run roughshod over the rest of your bases until you defeat it. If a golden cucco is left to graze for too long, it will become massive and even more difficult to deal with. And watch out if you have a cucco following you around on a map: the enemy's attacks won't anger it, but if you're playing as a character who uses mainly attacks with a wide range...good luck.
    • The Cuccos also appear in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, no more different than other depictions, except not even enemies are immune to them, leading to several humorous cases including a case where a giant Hinox is slaughtered by them. They won't do this for Lynels though. In fact, they attack you for bringing them to them.
  • The final boss of Let's Go Jungle is a giant killer butterfly. Because after all the other giant creepy crawlies in this game, why not butterflies?
  • Lie of Caelum: The Pomshires look like cute, overly saccharine dogs, but one of the developer's Youtube videos shows that they're capable of using firearms to defend themselves against poachers. The developer states that this video is canon, which may explain why the Pom Pom Yu cafe sells powerful equipment if the player donates enough to them.
  • Life Goes On has the cuddly ball of fur with anime eyes called Jeff. Jeff appears on each level and to unlock clothing options you have feed him one of your knights, which he'll happily devour in one bite before falling asleep.
  • Mokomoko from Lightning Legend: Daigo no Daibouken is pretty much a near-literal example of this: it's a legendary creature looking like a big furball rabbit, which runs at a blazing speed and can pull off strong and fast combos.
  • Every single monster in Lil' Monster is like this. Although some of them are meant to be fierce and imposing, every monster in the game is rendered in a cute, Super-Deformed style. Even the final boss, portrayed as a kind of Eldritch Abomination, still has a head that's half the size of his body and dewy eyes.
  • LittleBigPlanet: Sackboy. He's adorable, perpetually happy and silly, and wants to pal around with his friends. He's also a reality-altering super-powered entity who can create whole worlds with pure thought, alter the state of any object, fly, control time, and has a mean right hook.
  • Kukuri in Magical Battle Arena. She's a Super-Deformed sorceress that uses hilariously cute spells and out-adorables every other character by miles (which is saying something since this game is filled to the brim with Magical Girls), but good grief, she is deadly. Between the strawberry firing Strawberry Snake (read: Machine Gun), the smiling pink Mini-Planet (read: Gravity Sucks Mines), and the cat totem-pole Long Voiced Cat (read: Mana Drain), all of which she can cast nigh-instantaneously, she's a deceptively dangerous fighter in the battlefield.
  • Mana Khemia has several enemies that fit this description, including Punis (jelly blobs), Koalarias (koala bears that hop around on enormous spiked logs) and Brownies (which are tiny but wield very large hammers), but the party members also have their share. Nikki's mana is a shy tree fairy with a killer Green Thumb. Pamela leaves most of the fighting to her possessed teddy and its ridiculously large claws. And then there's Muppy...
  • Pretty much every enemy in MapleStory falls into this trope. As a rule, the cuter the creature is the faster it will kill you.
    • There are tons of high-leveled monsters that would like to object to that, but examples do exist, especially when low-leveled. See: Slime King, Mushmom, (Dark) Yeti and Pepe, and Bob the Snail. Be especially careful with that last one.
    • A more recent addition is Pink Bean, a pink, Pikachu-like boss that eats, sleeps, and plants flowers during the first half of the fight, and then starts killing half of your party members off in a single attack.
    • The Elemental Kittens of Doom (Jr. Cellion, Sakura Cellion, Jr. Lioner, and Jr. Grupin). They act all pathetic when getting beat up and all but they mob like crazy and can spell doom for those who are more than a few levels below their Level 33.
  • Maximo vs. Army of Zin has the Rarbite, an ordinary looking rabbit that, when attacked, transforms into a vicious demon that latches onto your ankle and gradually drains your health until removed.
  • Officer Denise Marmalade from The Misadventures of Tron Bonne pretty much defines dorkiness in her first appearance. In her second, she's probably the first boss that's actually a threat who can shoulder-throw Tron's Humongous Mecha with her bare hands.
  • The appropriately named "Double" from Mega Man X4. He's a short, round, inoffensive-looking reploid who's only about as tall as X (Read: short) and his only job on the base teeters between radio-operator and janitor. Then he reveals himself as The Mole, grows to about three times X's size thanks to the Shapeshifter Baggage stored in his "stomach" complete with Wolverine-claws and a complete Evil Makeover, and gives X one heck of a nasty fight.
  • Mega Man Zero 3 has a literal example with Childre Inarabbita. His battle form is that of a rabbit, and his humanoid form, is that of a child. He's also one of the Eight Judges that govern The Empire alongside X and his Fake King replacement.
  • One of Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake's most Guide Dang It! obstacles is the MSX cartridge guarded by 'deadly poisonous Zanzibar hamsters'. At this point, Snake's life bar is as long as it can get, and he has shot down a Hind D helicopter, and Metal Gear D's guided missiles only take off about a sixth of his health bar, but touching one of the tiny brown rodents causes instant death. That said, they die in one hit, so once you've worked out the puzzle to lure them from their hiding place you only need to stand in front of the hole and fire.
  • Metroid:
    • The eponymous Metroids themselves are an inversion of the trope, since your first impression is how deadly they are, but if you come across one that isn't trying to consume your soul... d'awwwwwwwww. They're typically babies when encountered, make an adorable chirping sound, eatnote  by glomping, and if you're lucky enough to have one imprint on you, you don't even need to stick your head between your legs and kiss your arse goodbye.
    • Metroid: Other M gives us "Little Birdie", a little white fluffy thing that looks sort of like an armless mouse standing on chicken legs. It was considered to be a failure as a bioweapon, so the scientists kept him as a pet. And then it ate one of them. To be fair, it should have tipped them off with its malevolent, soul-piercing gaze. And it wasn't a failure at all. The scientists who cloned the Space Pirates didn't realize that Ridley had a larval stage.
  • Minecraft had a literal example of this trope, which was originally added in the snapshots of version 1.8 of the game. They were incredibly rare but also incredibly dangerous, doing seven hearts of damage to a player without armor. They were Dummied Out a few weeks after being added due to being "a tired joke" and "basically a random death event", although it can still be summoned with commands.
  • Monster Hunter:
    • The series has Felynes in most games, small, cute little Funny Animal cat-like critters who don't usually attack unless provoked. However, if you throw a Felvine Bomb at a large monster, they will viciously mob that thing and start pummeling it for the Felvine; keep in mind large monsters include things like Rathalos, Lagiacrus, Barioth, or even worse! They also tend to use Mad Bomber techniques in older games. Counts for Badass Adorable when you realize you can hire them as hunting assistants called Palicoes. Their darker-furred cousins, the Melynxes, while still cute, are aggressive Bandit Mooks who attack on sight and steal your stuff.
    • Monster Hunter (2004): Yian Kut-ku is a Bird Wyvern that looks and acts like a giant chicken. However, it still tries to rip your throat out on sight and it breathes fire.
    • Monster Hunter Generations:
      • Mizutsune is a graceful, beautiful Leviathan with rainbow scales and purple fur, and it has the ability to...make bubbles. However, the ones fought in-game are all males in breeding season, and when a male Mizutsune gets horny, it also gets very territorial. Once you're all soaped up by those bubbles, you'll be too off-balance to attack, and you'll slip and flail around like an idiot while the damned thing slides circles around you and gives you the beating of a lifetime.
      • Ahtal-Ka, at first glance, might seem like a slightly-bigger-than-normal bug...until it pulls out something known as the Ahtal-Neset. You see, Ahtal-ka is a smart Neopteron; it sneaks into abandoned fortifications, steals parts such as Dragonators, gathers some other assorted materials and produces some webbing, and then builds a fucking mecha the size of a building with them. And the ones you fight aren't even at full strength; apparently, they're supposed to be three times that size when fully complete.
    • Monster Hunter: World:
      • Dodogama. A derpy looking fat lizard who's mostly just content to munch on rocks and waddle around...until you piss it off. Then it starts spitting lava at you.
      • Kulu-ya-ku is a goofy looking egg thief based on a dodo bird. However, those arms it uses to steal eggs? They can also carry boulders. Boulders it can and will smash you over the head with.
      • Paolumu is a Flying Wyvern that mostly just wanders around the Coral Highlands, but it'll inflate itself like a balloon and start kicking your ass from the sky once angry.
      • Banbaro effectively amounts to a huge moose. However, moose in real life are actually very territorial. Meaning that it's a foul-tempered behemoth that's also an invasive species and can fucking throw giant boulders and trees at you.
  • Monster Rancher:
  • Mortal Kombat:
    • In Mortal Kombat: Shaolin Monks, Kung Lao has a secret, unlisted move called Unfriendly Rabbit, which is simply murderous. The enemy just sits there and pets it while you get the hell back, and then, out of nowhere, the little lagomorph suddenly tears into the enemy. When it says Fatality, the rabbit pops out of the enemy's... maybe it was stomach. Then it sits there as if nothing happened.
    • And Kung Lao can use a bunny to beat his enemy to death. These are based on Kung Lao's Friendship where he pulls a bunny out of his hat. Only here, it's turned into a Fatality.
    • In Mortal Kombat 3 (and the Ultimate and Trilogy versions), the characters have special finishing moves called "Animalities" where they turn into animals and attack their opponent. In Ultimate, Kitana turns into a white rabbit, before mauling the enemy's happy sacks. Since pretty much all the vicious beasts had already been taken in the vanilla game, some other characters (re)introduced in the revisions also have Animalities where they turn into seemingly cute little animals, such as Jade (a kitten), Rain (a baby elephant) and Scorpion (a friggin' penguinnote ).
  • Usagi from Mr. Driller is literally this trope.
  • Mr. Hopp's Playhouse: Mr. Hopp is a demonic stuffed rabbit hellbent on getting you.
  • You know what rabbits stereotypically like to eat? Carrots. However, as anyone who has ever played Mushroom Men can attest, this is a damn lie. They actually enjoy eating tasty little mushroom boys. Take one step toward one of those Green Rocks-possessed, lapine monstrocities, and just watch how fast you die.
  • Since animals available as starting pets in NetHack are designed to be viable combat escorts for the Player Character, they tend to be disproportionately powerful. This includes ponies, dogs, and kittens; kittens that can kill a squad of grown men and clean the flesh from their bones in seconds. Oh, and the fluff quote for kittens? A passage from "The Cats of Ulthar".
  • Neverwinter Nights 2: Mask of the Betrayer: The insanely difficult Superboss is a giant badger. Badgers are actually incredibly vicious and dangerous, a giant one even moreso.
  • In a game like NieR: Automata full of Killer Robots, what is one of your most dangerous foes? Giant mooses and boars. They level up with the player, have a lot of HP, hit like a truck, and (obviously) can't be hacked with 9S. Fortunately, they usually only attack you if you attack them first.
  • Nippon Ichi:
    • The knife-carrying, explosive and possessed-by-the-souls-of-criminals penguins known as Prinnies from most of the games since Disgaea: Hour of Darkness. And as if the regular ones weren't bad enough, the final ultimate form of Overlord Baal, the most powerful lord in all said games is a prinny as well.
    • Starting with Dark Hero Days, the position of most powerful bonus boss has been usurped by Pringer X, a tiny robotic Prinny that doesn't look threatening, aside from its red angry eyes.
    • Before even prinnies, we had Eryngi, cute little mushroom creatures that call up mushrooms to attack and say 'gii!' a lot. One of them actually demands that you kneel down and beg for your lives lest "your blood will rain on me, gii!" I don't need to say who. Another Eryngi appears in Disgaea 4 as the True Final Boss. It is also a part of God.
    • The Catsabers, present in multiple Nippon Ichi games, resemble children in cat costumes, but are generally no less deadly than any of the other species of monsters you're likely to run into. They also have a more diabolical relative called the Deathsaber, with an appearance resembling a bat, rather than a cat.
    • Desco from Disgaea 4 Daw, isn't she just the cutest little wannabe-Eldritch Abomination ever? You just can't help but want to give her a hug... at least until she pulls out her ultimate attack: the very aptly titled Yog Sothoth.
    • Usalia from Disgaea 5 is someone you just want to hug, whether it's to comfort her after all the crap she's endured or because she's rainbow-vomiting cute. Even if she's chewing on curry after adorably flinging a moon-sized prinny at your face. And that's without getting her mad or depriving her of curry, upon which she'd claw you to death.
    • She arguably outclasses the Trope Namer in terms of being a literal Killer Rabbit the moment she unlocks her Overload Skill "Murmur of Rage". Its an infamous Game-Breaker known for being capable of wiping out or severely injuring entire armies by herself played properly. It's considered amongst the most effective ways to fight Baal.
  • Nobody Saves the World:
    • The rabbit familiars summoned by Magician's Hat Trick skill look like normal white bunnies, but they are fast and deal a lot of damage with their attacks, quickly tearing your enemies to shreds.
    • Some of your forms, such as Rat, Turtle or Slug, are small and harmless-looking, but they are just as capable in a fight as the more monstrous transformations.
  • The Top 4 musical artist of No Straight Roads is Yinu, a piano player that happens to be 9 years old. Zuke and Mayday are initially hesitant at having to fight a child, but she's proven to be no less formidable than the other artists. Then her mother shows up after you inflict enough damage.
  • Oddworld: Munch's Oddysee's Fuzzles, looking like furry cute big-eyed blob types... which happen to be voracious carnivores and can be used like attack animals by Munch with More Teeth than the Osmond Family. And if you don’t rescue enough of them, they’ll ensure Abe and Munch don’t make it out of Vykkers Labs alive...
  • An almost literal example from Odin Sphere is Prince Cornelius. He looks all cute and stuff, but easily he'll hand you your ass with his Zero-like fighting style.
  • Ōkamiden, a Nintendo DS followup to Ōkami, stars Chibiterasu, a puppy replacement for Amaterasu. Being the main player character in an Action-Adventure game, how couldn't it be a Killer Rabbit?
  • Yamausagi from Onmyoji looks cute enough, but she is just as dangerous in combat as any other yōkai in the game.
  • Willo and Moji from Paladins are the smallest and cutest champions in the game, being a fairy and a rabbit girl respectively. However, Willo has powerful explosive magic and Moji will not hesitate to transform enemies into doggie treats to feed to her familiar.
  • Paper Mario:
    • The original game brings us Anti-Guys, who merely appear to be Shy Guys dressed in black. However, they possess boss level HP and have an extremely high attack power, being able to cause as much as 12 damage per hit. Fighting them is completely optional, however. The first one seen is guarding a chest and can be bribed with a piece of candy, plus he'll specifically warn you multiple times about picking a fight with him. You can later get three of them sicced on you as punishment for failing a minigame, and it's easily the hardest fight in the game.
    • On the topic of the Paper Mario games (first and second), Amayzee Dayzees. Cute, shiny anthropomorphized flowers, have a tendency to just run away from the battle due to their high EXP yield... and when they don't, WATCH OUT!! 20 HP, 20 attack, and 1 defense. Good luck taking one out, as it'll either run before you get the chance, or kill you.
  • Perfect World has antelope. They look almost harmless compared to the typical werewolf or protoplasmic ooze, but they are both aggressive and equipped with a dangerous Mana burn.
  • When you finally catch up to the Girl in Black in Persona, she pulls out Tesso. It's a giant mechanical rat that makes cat-like noises. Any females in your party will Squee over it... until it opens fire. Kei then mocks them for falling for it. Tesso's the boss of the area.
  • Phantasy Star has giant zombie rabbits that despite being, you know, undead, still look pretty cute with their missing ear and all, then they split in half and fire acid at you.
  • Pikmin:
    • The Pikmin are dime-sized carrot creatures on a planet full of tennis ball sized monsters, but under your control can EAT those monsters and grow their numbers from their corpses.
    • The Hairy Bulborb from Pikmin 2 has huge blue eyes, a tubby round body, and is covered all over in incredibly soft-looking white fuzz. It's downright cuddly. However, as with any enemy in Pikmin games, if you so much as look at it wrong, the Pik-carnage will be brutal.
  • Planescape: Torment has the Lim-lim. You can buy one on the market as a cute pet, and it doesn't do much. Then in a different area of town, you meet a circle of magicians that attempt to summon a wild one... and it promptly slaughters all of them. It's also pretty dangerous to you should you provoke it.
    • From the same game, both Morte the floating skull and Nordom the four-armed cube thingy are much more dangerous than they seem. On one side, Morte is way tougher than any skull has the right to be and has both a nasty set of chompers and such a way with words even the most cool-headed mages get blindingly enraged and try to punch him. On the other side, Nordom still has the tough constitution only Mechanus alloys can provide and is a crack shot with his two Automatic Crossbows.
  • Many Pokémon would fall under this. For that matter, many Mons series critters and cute anime mascots fall into this trope.
    • Several of the incredibly powerful "legendaries", like Mew and Jirachi, are certainly small and harmless-looking. However, in the game, Mew has good stats and can learn almost every available technique — every TM and BP move is available to this Mythical Pokémon (and don't even get us started on its signature Z-Move, Genesis Supernova). And Jirachi has a powerful Steel-type Signature Move called Doom Desire, which lets loose a devastating bundle of light on the foe after a set number of turns have passed.
    • The only Pokemon that can learn Metronome, an attack that can randomly use nearly any move in the game, by level up are cute Pokemon. "Togepi used Metronome! Togepi used Fire Blast!"
    • The best example would be the Mystery Dungeon series. Since you are not allowed to evolve your main character until the post-game, the final battle will always be something on the lines of two tiny, cuddly starters punching the crap out of the resident Olympus Mons (as well as the occasional Eldritch Abomination).
    • The sixth generation introduces the Fairy type. The type even sounds cute, and plenty of its members certainly are. The type is super-effective against the Dragon type.
    • Mawile's Pokédex entry states that it lulls its foes into letting down their guard with its cute face, and then attacks them with its huge jaw-like horns. It retains that cuteness when it Mega Evolves and becomes the Pokémon with the absolute highest Attack stat in the game without stat boosts. For the record, Mawile resembles a little girl in a miko dress with a large ponytail containing a huge mouth, upgrading to huge pigtails when it Mega Evolves.
    • Pachirisu was dismissed as just another useless "Pika-clone." Then it won the World Championships.
    • All starter Pokémon start out cute and relatively weak, but evolve into something more threatening, and later evolve again into a huge, terrifying, powerful beast. Most other multi-stage evolvers follow this pattern.

      Among fully evolved starter Pokémon, Cinderace stands out as a literal example. It is a fire-elemental rabbit with high attack and speed stats, one of the game's most powerful hidden abilities, and a unique attack with high power that lacks the usual accuracy or recharge issues that keeps moves of that power in check.
    • A literal example in Pokémon is Azumarill. It was a Joke Character when it was first introduced, but four generations of badass levels, including and especially being given the Fairy type in Generation VI, have turned it into one of the game's premiere dragon slayers. Oh, and, according to the Pokédex, it's a carnivore.
    • Munchlax and Gible. The former is a Big Eater that eats almost anything, including the heroes' lunch, and the latter is an Extreme Omnivore that can eat anything, including metal.
    • Another literal example is Diggersby. It is often dismissed as a trash Com Mon, but if it has Huge Power (The same ability that makes Azumarill so potent) as its ability, its attack can surpass Groudon's attack.
    • Sun and Moon introduces Stufful and its evolution Bewear, who manage to combine this with Bears Are Bad News. They're adorable pink creatures that look like a cross between a plush animal and a red panda, but their Pokédex entries describe them as extremely dangerous Pokémon. Stufful has incredible strength and flies into a violent rage when touched by someone it doesn't know, and Bewear, an oversized, pink fluffy teddy bear, tends to give spine-crushing bear hugs to its Trainer. Its habitat is off-limits for this reason, despite its cute appearance.
    • Wishiwashi is a harmless-looking fish with a pitiful stat total of 175. The Pokédex states that it's also "notably tasty". As a result, everyone's out to get it. However, once it hits level 20, its Schooling ability kicks in and it gains the ability to summon a massive school of its kind to combine with. Suddenly, the eight-inch long, 0.7-pound small fry becomes a terrifying Fish That Walks bigger than Ultra Necrozma and heavier than Slowbro whose stats outmatch those of Mythical Pokémon and pseudo-legendaries. It will remain like this until its health drops below 25%. According to the Pokédex, Wishiwashi's School Form (also known as the "demon of the sea"), is feared by aquatic Pokémon far and wide — even Gyarados are terrified of this thing!
    • Cranidos is a cute, unassuming dinosaur-like Pokémon… but the specific dinosaur it’s based on is the Pachycephalosaurus, so its headbutts will hurt a lot; in fact, its Attack stat is 125, the highest of any unevolved Pokémon (discounting those that don’t evolve), equaling that of Gyarados, Landorus, and Golisopod!
    • Cinccino is a cute, fluffy chinchilla with a soft scarf. It's also very fast with a good Attack stat, a solid movepool, and specializes in moves that hit multiple times, boosted by its abilities Technician (which boosts the power of its weaker moves, much like Marshadow above) and Skill Link (which forces all multi-hitting moves to hit the maximum number of times possible).
    • Sword and Shield introduces three more.
      • First, there's the literal rabbit Cinderace and its beefy 116 Attack stat plus its Gigantamax move that can bypass moves and Abilities like Follow Me and Flash Fire.
      • Second, there's Appletun. At first, it looks like an adorable cross between a dragon and an apple turnover, and a base 100 Special Attack stat is respectable but nothing to write home about. However, it can make up for that with its base 110 HP stat and its signature move Apple Acid, which is basically Energy Ball with a guaranteed stat debuff. Couple that with its G-Max Sweetness which heals status conditions and deals hefty Grass-Type damage, and it has quite a bit of versatility between offense, defense, and support.
      • Third, there's Hatterene. It may look like a fairy tale princess with a witch's hat, but don't let that fool you. Its Dex entries say that it can tear people apart with that tentacle coming out if its head just for being too loud. The Pokédex even calls it the Forest Witch.
    • Pokémon Scarlet and Violet:
      • Tinkaton may look small, pink, and adorable, but they also carry around a massive homemade hammer that they're not afraid to use on anyone that displeases them. According to the Pokédex, they're the sole reason Corviknight isn't used as a major method of transportation in Paldea — because Tinkaton has a habit of launching large rocks at them to try and knock them out of the sky.
      • Clodsire might look a bit doofy, being a quadrupedal Poison/Ground-type Quagsire and all. However, it has obscene HP and Special Defense along with being able to learn Amnesia, making it last even longer against special attackers. It can even do a Death or Glory Attack that involves sticking out massive spines from its body. It also happens to be the ace of Rika, an Elite Four member.
      • There's Scream Tail and Iron Bundle, both from Area Zero. The former is an ancient Paradox Pokémon that heavily resembles Jigglypuff. The latter is a futuristic Paradox Pokémon that resembles Delibird. Despite their cute appearance, they are actually dangerous Pokémon that will pursue the player if they spot them. Penny was easily deceived by their cute appearance and she was almost brutally attacked by them if it wasn't for the player intervening.
      • And then there's Chi-Yu, a legendary Dark/Fire embodiment of envy that is Made of Evil who, along with its three partners-in-crime, brought ruin to an ancient empire before being sealed, and its Pokédex entry states it can burn so hot to melt the ground. So how does it look like? A small goldfish. (That lore bit about melting the ground? So it can swim in it!) This is especially jarring when you find out that its partners-in-crime are a literal Snowy Sabertooth (Chien-Pao), a huge moose (Ting-Lu) and a giant snail (Wo-Chien), each being considerably larger than Chi-Yu.
      • Pecharunt. Looks like one of the series' Ridiculously Cute Critter with its adorable looking appearance and face right? Well, this is the same Pokémon that brainwashed people who eats its mochi and was the true reason behind why the Loyal Three were so evil.
  • The fanmade Pokémon parody Pokémon Edge Rising has Squirro, a "regional rodent" that resembles a cute squirrel with terrible stats. Even the Dex tells you not to use it because it's probably just a normal squirrel. However, it has the ability "Bloodmode", with the vague description "The blood moon shall rise", which seems to do nothing... until Squirro reaches level 20. Stick with it to that point, and the cute squirrel will turn Red and Black and Evil All Over and see its stats skyrocket, functioning very much like Wishiwashi (above) in that it reverts to its normal stats once its health is below 25%. According to the lore, Bloodmode is a sort of reverse Nirvana of pure hatred and wrath that Squirro have attained due to their resentment over being dismissed as weak and useless.
  • Poppy Playtime: While much, much larger than typical examples of the trope, Huggy Wuggy still qualifies. He's a big blue stuffed animal that looks like a cross between a sock monkey and Grover with a smile that never goes away. He's also the factory's security system that's gone impossibly out of control, turning him into a stealthy Super-Persistent Predator with Nested Mouths containing two rows of razor-sharp teeth and a habit of biting trespassers' heads off.
  • There's a Killer Rabbit terrain in Populous. Piglet World is a land of pleasant, grassy meadows and flowering trees... and is apparently so deadly that your little piggy people will start dying immediately after leaving their homes.
  • Psychosomnium has rabbits (or maybe people in rabbit costumes) who block your way and demand carrots, and kill you instantly via Collision Damage if you touch them.
  • Little Mac from Punch-Out!! is roughly half the size of the majority of his opponents, yet he can throw lightning fast punches so powerful he can topple them with ease.
  • Quest for Glory IV has actual killer rabbits. Then there's the old lady's pet kitty in the first game, if you're a thief. And those pesky antwerps...
  • In Ragnarok Online, everything is cute. And higher level monsters love to occasionally hang out in lower level areas — while looking just as cute. A newbie character goes out in the field and merrily slaughters giant pink blobs, caterpillars and bunnies — but death awaits him, dare he lay a hand on a butterfly or a rare big blue bunny. A quest to become an acolyte entails a pilgrimage across a couple zones to a monastery — and those who undertake it should not attack the cute little monkeys, no matter how annoying the are, lest they will be torn to shreds by them. Later, after taking down ferocious looking wolves (and some giant violinist grasshoppers) you may think that you can take on the ladybug that stole the drops from said wolves? Nope. The list goes on.
  • Ratchet & Clank:
    • Ratchet. Small, fuzzy, and carries around more firepower than even the Pentagon could dream of.
    • Also, from the second game in the series, we have the Protopets — cute, Tribble-like critters that have rows of shark-like teeth, a nasty temperament, and the tendency to eat anything or anyone they encounter. Oh, and they have the reproductive ability of the original Tribbles as well.
  • The Rabbids from Rayman: Raving Rabbids aren't quite literal killer rabbits (their violence tends more towards slapstick Amusing Injuries), but they're still violently insane and insanely violent. And they're trying to take over the Earth and television. They're succeeding. Worse still, they, for a time, forced Rayman out of the series and stole his role as main character.
    • Back when Rayman: Raving Rabbids was going to be a platformer, the Rabbids were going to be hideous, vicious, and downright horrible creatures, instead of the insane but humorous critters they are today.
  • Reality-On-The-Norm: A recurring character is a chicken called "The Chicken". Some characters consider him cute. He is a sociopath, has a gun, and sometimes kills people.
  • One of the random events in RimWorld can drive members of the local wildlife insane with homicidal bloodlust. Tales abound on the official forums of colonies being overwhelmed by such things as hordes of enraged squirrels.
  • The Fairy you can recruit in Romancing SaGa 3 is a very versatile character, good with Spears, and Bows.
  • Iris Sepperin of RosenkreuzStilette counts as well. While she may be a cute little girl, she's more evil than expected because she delights in causing as much chaos as possible and manipulating others because she thinks it's fun. And, being the Magnificent Bastard she is, she even manipulated RKS into attacking the Empire just for the fun of it! And no one knew she did just that because they all thought her to just be a kind, innocent girl. And since she's Affably Evil, she just happens to be that damn proud of it. The only ones who could see through her were the Empire, Karl, and Grolla, but Iris, being The Chessmaster, always has a backup strategy so that she outsmarts them at every turn. And her being "kidnapped" doesn't help, either.
  • The player character in Rune Factory 3 can turn into a powerful monster that can beat the crap out of his foes with brawling skills that would put a Bare-Fisted Monk to shame. It looks like this.
  • In RuneScape, the player is required to get rid of a "giant wolpertinger" (as part of the original Wolf Whistle quest) and thinks it is just a "harmless wee rabbit". Subverted of sorts when it turned out to be a dangerous and heinous monster.
    • The relevant quest has been rewritten. Now the giant wolpertinger is summoned by the player, and the enemy trolls are the ones who disregard it as a harmless wee rabbit, until it scatters them.
    • RuneScape also teaches us that penguins are evil Soviet expires hell-bent on exterminating humanity and conquering Gielinor.
    • Slayer Master Chaeldar is a fairy. One of those tiny buzzing folk from the moon, who deal mainly in lost teeth? Yeah. As a Slayer Master, she's a professional expert at killing anything and everything, and during "The World Wakes" she personally joins in fighting the God Wars Generals and their armies.
    • Old School RuneScape actually has a "level 2" rabbit in Priffdinas that turns out to have extremely high combat stats.
  • The Kamis from Ryzom are kinda cute, but if you do too much harvesting in one area, their magic shall fall on you like the hammer of god.
  • Max of Sam & Max: Freelance Police is a literal example. Max may not be particularly cute (though YMMV) but he is an anthropomorphic rabbit with a penchant for violence.
  • Rascal Rabbits in Seal Online are a literal example, white rabbits bearing a bloody cleaver and are carnivorous.
  • Shadow Warrior
    • Doubles as a Shout-Out to Monty Python and the Holy Grail. Throughout the game, you can find little rabbits running around and can even kill them without a problem. However, in one secret area, you will find a rabbit that's out for blood, complete with a discarded helmet and grail. Lo Wang will even exclaim "That's no ordinary rabbit," as the little furry menace rushes at you and begins to gnaw away your health!
    • The reboot brings this back, where if you kill enough random rabbits, the next one you attack will be a Boss in Mook's Clothing. It turns black, begins crackling with demonic energy, it can teleport, it laughs off gunfire and requires several sword strikes to kill, and heavy metal music plays while it runs after you trying to kill you.
    • And in the sequel to the reboot, they grow five feet tall and set themselves on fire. AND, just to add a hint of paranoia, your critical attacks now have a super critical chance to polymorph any enemy into a rabbit. While you're mindlessly chopping / shooting / blowing shit up. But if you intentionally WANT to invoke this trope, partly for the loot from a 1v1 epic boss, partly for the 10 demon bunnies achievement, there's a bunny gun that increases the super crit.
  • Jack Frost in the Shin Megami Tensei games, when he appears as a Superboss.
    • Even worse, Alice. Cute magical girl? Sure.
    • A more literal but lesser known example is the Hare of Inaba.
  • Sonic the Hedgehog has its fair share of cute anthropomorphic animals that obliterate Killer Robots on a daily basis. The straightest example comes from Cream (a literal rabbit) but especially her Chao companion named Cheese, who is even tinier, squishier, and cuter than the various animals, but can fly at extreme speeds, is effectively impervious to harm, and will ram giant death machines into oblivion. Various media can play this straight for him or subvert it.
  • sora gives us Star Breaker, an utterly adorable-looking girl who also happens to be an insane Omnicidal Maniac with a penchant for lobbing bombs at people and burning things to ashes.
  • The Orz from Star Control II seem relatively harmless: they talk funny, and resemble disembodied heads with tentacles and parrotfish-like faces. But their ships are actually quite powerful. And then the game starts dropping hints that they're extensions of a sinister extradimensional monster and were responsible for the disappearance of the Androsynth... and if you continue to pester them with questions about the Androsynth, the Orz won't hesitate to silence you violently.
    Orz: Nnnnnggggaaaahhhhh!!!!!! It is dancing!!!!
  • Starcraft II: One map in the Purifier arc takes place on a forested planetoid orbited by a shielded space station, the shields of which can only be turned off from the surface. Naturally, there are small furry creatures visible around the map... small being a relative term, because one of them is playing the bongoes on Terran marine helmets and looks like it could hold all three in its mouth (and marine armor turns the wearer into a seven-eight feet tall walking tank).
  • The Chichifa from StarFlight 2. You never see a picture of them. But the Humna Humna trade buoy orbiting their homeworld describes them as "A race of highly prolific, small, furry creatures with long, upright ears and puffy tails. Extremely aggressive, they will swarm to any heat source and attack. Recommend caution."
  • Similarly, in another one of tri-Ace's games, Star Ocean: Till the End of Time, the Sooties (little balls of soot with eyes) are by far the most difficult regular monsters you'll ever meet. They're insanely fast and strong, and due to their tiny size are really difficult to hit. Incidentally, the first Star Ocean includes a "Vorpal Bunny" as one of its enemies. Though it does look cutesey, it's also twice the size of a human, so not all that cute.
  • The Memaus in Startopia are cute little cat-like creatures that wander around the station. They eat litter, and any guests who pet one get a bonus to happiness. The problem is that, if it's been well-fed, it simultaneously infects the petter with a parasite which will transform the guest into a decidedly not cute "Skrasher" which cuts a swathe of destruction and can absorb a terrifying amount of damage before keeling over. And if your security can't kill the Skrasher fast enough, it explodes... into more Memaus.
  • Star Wars: The Old Republic has Treek, an Ewok who not only used to fight alongside Mandolorians, but can also serve as tank or healer, something no other companion can do, and gives a bonus to all crafting missions.
  • The Rampage Rabbit from Summon Night: Swordcraft Story 2. After you beat it the first time, it trains itself so that it can beat you afterwards, and is aiming to be the most powerful rabbit.
  • In addition to Kirby, mentioned above already, Super Smash Bros. has a few other innocent-looking death machines. Jigglypuff earned its place as a Lethal Joke Character for its ability to one-shot players at relatively low damage with its stupidly powerful "Rest" attack, along with an effective aerial moveset.
    • Toon Link also could count. He's a cute-looking kid with a toy sword who can also kick your ass eight ways to Sunday with an array of weaponry (and the skill to use it) that's just as impressive as his adult self.
  • Super Robot Wars 30 gives us Giant Sang Yung. A kaiju sized drawing of Princess Aska's retainer Sang Yung, the Dreikruez's ladies (and Ikumi) find it incredibly cute and the male pilots find it distracting because of its cuteness. Then, it fires an energy beam from its mouth like Godzilla that can deal massive damage and lower your morale. And the best thing is is that you can recruit it for your team and turn this Killer Rabbit on your enemies!
  • The Liir from Sword of the Stars are a playable example. They look like friendly whales and dolphins, and are, whenever possible, Actual Pacifists. However, if you push them to the point that this is no longer possible, it can easily lead to bad things. The game's resident Abusive Precursors, the Suul'Ka did this by enslaving the Liir and threatening to pollute their oceans to an uninhabitable state. There are no more Suul'Ka in this sector of the galaxy, and possibly in the universe; the Liir used their talent for biotechnology to wipe them out with a genetically engineered retro-plague.
  • Carrotia from Tails Skypatrol is a cute, harmless looking rabbit in a carrot-shaped rocket... who shoots carrot missiles and has poison kisses.
  • Tales of Berseria: Pheonix is a cute little cat creature, most of his kind having been used for Plucky Comic Relief throughout the game... however, Pheonix is a deadly Optional Boss who will whipe the floor with you and take several minutes to beat as he zips around as a Lightning Bruiser.
  • Later versions of Terraria feature bunny rabbits hopping around the landscape... which during a Blood Moon turn into Corrupt Bunnies in Corruption worlds or Vicious/Crimtane Bunnies in Crimson worlds, which can be fairly deadly foes for characters just starting out.
  • Arguably anyone from the Touhou Project series.
    • If nobody else, Nazrin qualifies, being a mouse youkai.
    • Cute girls possessing ridonkulous levels of power (with a few exceptions) tend to be this trope by default. Perhaps the best example is Flandre Scarlet, by all appearances an 8-year-old girl with a personality to match who will utterly destroy you.
    • It is canon in Touhou that on the moon there is an entire race of humanoid Moon Rabbits that make up most, if not all, of the Lunarians' army. This in essence plays it straight almost completely literally, but at the same time somewhat subverts it as they act like rabbits, lazy, carefree, and fun loving, so aren't quite as deadly as they could be. Though still deadly.
      • Of particular note among those is Reisen Udongein Inaba, especially if you go by her portrayal in Inaba of the Moon and Inaba of the Earth where she is an outright Butt-Monkey and her fanon portrayals which do essentially the same. It's too easy to forget that the "useless little bunny only good for her sex appeal" can Mind Rape your sorry ass, manipulate people's emotions and fire Eye Beams.
    • According to Hieda no Akyuu, to some people, Yuuka Kazami just seems like a polite but weak flower youkai. She even includes a nice, peaceful looking picture of her. Akyuu goes on to assign her a threat level of "Extremely High" and a human friendship level of "Worst." Given that Yuuka has claimed, sincerely or otherwise, to consider genocide a game, this might not be an entirely unreasonable assessment.
    • Clownpiece is a fairy (read: cute, childlike cannon fodder) wearing a clown outfit colored like the American flag. Clownpiece is also possibly the toughest stage 5 boss in Touhou history and has the ability to induce violent insanity in people. (Including players.)
  • A literal version in Toy Fighter, a fighting game where all the characters are Living Toys. One of the selectable fighters is Cymbals the giant pink stuffed bunny, who despite his cuddly-looking appearance is one of the largest and most durable Lightning Bruiser fighters that can be selected.
  • Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion: Since the main character and his friends and neighbors are living fruits, vegetables, and other foodstuffs, most of the enemies in the game are herbivorous animals like snails, earthworms, and rabbits.
  • The Twisted Tales of Spike McFang features rabbits that will suddenly open their large mouths filled with sharp teeth in order to latch onto the hero. They are called Python Bunnies.
  • Undertale:
    • See that cute little flower who greets you at the start of the game? He does this to you about two minutes later. He's also a soulless psychopath and the Big Bad of the entire game... although when he fights you as the final boss he no longer looks cute or harmless in any way.
    • The Genocide run, where you, as a small child murder countless of monsters, even those who are extremely experienced in combat or possess superpowers.
  • Another literal example: the rabbit-people in Utawarerumono seem peaceful and diplomatic, at least compared to all the Blood Knight nations around them. People wonder how they haven't been conquered yet. Then, when they get attacked, they show it's because they still have Humongous Mecha from before the apocalypse.
  • The deadliest monsters in Valkyrie Profile are neither dragons nor demons. No, the deadliest creatures in the game are... hamsters. And they will slaughter your party if you don't know how to handle them. In the Bonus Dungeon of both games, there is a possibility that you may fight hamsters right before the Optional Boss ...it's actually worth killing the Angel Iseria Queen 10 times to receive the Angel Slayer as it may give you a chance to hurt the hamsters.
  • Wasteland 2: The puppy (recruitable in Hollywood) is a downplayed example. It doesn't have a powerful attack, but it is entirely capable of finishing off weakened enemies, and attacks on its own initiative.
  • To a very literal extent, Lucky from Whacked!! Fuelled by pure unbridled rage after losing his feet to a good luck charm factory, he serves as the local personification of Wrath.
  • Wildermyth includes Avenger the golden rabbit, a spirit who once took the form of a magical sword. As a pet who can be adopted through an event, she's an adorable glowing bunny who grants the hero she's bonded to a boost to their combat damage. She wiggles her nose vindictively when she's adopted.
  • The Squirg from WildStar. They're cute, cuddly cephalopods that latch onto your head and takeover your brain.
    • Chua are adorable little fuzzballs of engineering genius and psychopathic destruction.
    • Aurin are in fact friendly tree-huggers. Just don't get on their bad side, as they are also vicious hunters and ferocious fighters.
    • Chompacabras. Adorable? Yes. Insatiably hungry, with rows and rows of sharp teeth? Yes. Treat anything as food? Yes.
  • Near the end of Wizardry VI: Bane of the Cosmic Forge, you may run into faeries in the same areas you're routinely facing down dark crusaders, greater demons, elite samurai squads, and mind flayers. The faeries are much more dangerous than any of the enemies just mentioned, and indeed one of the toughest enemy types in the game. Just be glad these unassuming Demonic Spiders don't show up until around the final dungeon.
  • Both chapters of SSI's Wizard's Crown duology featured these, as "white rabbits" in the first game and "snow rabbits" in the second. In the former case, they're a set-piece encounter more dangerous than just about any other pure-melee opponent in the Ruins, and provide a ridiculous quantity of high-quality loot. In the latter, they're wandering monsters in the toughest of the three wilderness areas, so their lethality is rather less inappropriate.
  • The Pig Butoh in The World Ends with You. Usually, pigs are cute, harmless Puzzle Mooks. Then you find the second-to-last of them. Unlike his fellows, he can be simply beaten to death... but can attack. And his attack stat is five times the final boss'.
    • Rhyme also count as this. Don't let her cute face above fool you, she's just as capable as the other players of using pins to win this game. Made a bit more literal when she became a cute Squirrel Noise after being erased; when used by Neku, the Rhyme pin falls squarely under Difficult, but Awesome.
  • World of Mana:
    • Rabites, which are sort of blobby killer rabbits. Although the yellow ones are little more than a nuisance, even to a small child, some of the other colors really are quite dangerous, especially the black ones.
    • The Black Rabite, one of the adorable little creatures mentioned above, with the respective color, is the most dangerous thing in the game. It looks like a small black bunny slipper until it opens a can of whoop-ass on you. The Black Rabite can be tamed a great deal by avoiding the use of spells or any tech stronger than the basic one, as these will not trigger its ferocious counterattacks. It also helps to use stat-affecting magic like the Necromancer's Black Curse spell and the Nightblade's Deadly Weapon spell. The remake has every character give an Oh, Crap! face when they realize just what they're about to face off against, and boy howdy is it warranted — it's higher in level than even the postgame boss, and that outlevels the actual Final Boss!
  • World of Warcraft:
    • This trope was parodied (before the Cataclysm) in a Warlock class quest. After fulfilling the desires of a clearly insane Gnome warlock NPC, he attempts so summon a powerful demon... but gets a giant chicken named "El Pollo Grande" (The Great Chicken) instead which, despite its appearance, isn't much a challenge.
    • Some gnome players. Yes, they may be small but that means they have the smallest game avatars to target and can pack the same punch as their peers in terms of class and level.
    • The female gnome Death Knight NPC with puffy pink ponytails, Darkrider Arly, deserves special mention.
    • And then there was the accidental Bear Reaver. Normally, a bear isn't that small and non-threatening, but when that model accidentally, in a Beta realm, replaced the gigantic Fel Reaver model in Hellfire Peninsula, and the thing went around looking like a medium-sized, low-level beast but still shaking the ground as it walked and remained capable of killing players with one hit, that sounds like an example of this trope.
    • The Darkmoon Rabbit. A rabbit, in a cave, surrounded by the bones of any player foolish enough to take it on.
    • Engineers can make a device called an Explosive Decoy that looks like a rabbit and just hops around a bit; if attacked, it explodes.
    • The second tier of Brawlpub has the penguin Dippy, who waddles cutely after the player, and falls cutely to the ground when hit with a direct-damage attack. It can't be rooted or slowed, however, and if it manages to get close enough to the player to use its Peck ability...
    • The elementals of Pandaria are adorable, but they can be deadly when provoked. Special mention goes to the ones on the Timeless Isle who can take off one third of the average level 90 player's health with their attacks and Lei Shi in the Terrace of Endless Spring.
  • Xenoblade Chronicles franchise
    • Several examples in Xenoblade Chronicles 1, most notably one of the ultra-difficult Superbosses, Despotic Arsene, a Level 108 Bunnia. For a point of reference, the Final Boss, a freaking God, is estimated to be around the mid-eighties in level. For another point of reference, the other Superbosses are giant beasts, dragons or large powerful robots.
    • Bunnits return in Xenoblade Chronicles 2, but the game also introduces a new type of cuddly critter known a Peppito which resembles a cross between a ferret and a fox. It normally acts as the game's Metal Slime, being prone to running away if not killed quickly and yielding a lot of EXP while not being even remotely threatening...at least until you encounter the level 120 superboss version named Chickenheart Dagmara. It initially seems fairly unremarkable outside of its ability to topple its foes with its regular attacks, but after it enrages, it'll start giving your party a taste of the floor with its Master Art special which makes it spontaneously conjure an energy blade and engage in swordplay that would make Jin proud.
      • Xenoblade Chronicles 2 also has Reeking Douglas, which is a Level 105 Unique Monster and a very small Rapchor. It starts off pretty easy, until it gets Enraged and summons high level Caterpiles to kill you, which can make the fight quite tough if you are only in the Level 70's when fighting this thing.
  • Ys VI: The Ark of Napishtim has Majunun, a cute little robot so comically tiny he's not actually visible in most screenshots of him. It's a lie to say he's the most powerful boss in the game — "most powerful enemy, period" is more accurate, as he technically only counts as a miniboss. He's capable of one-hit-killing a Level 31 Adol... and to get one useful accessory, you have to either kill him, or manage not to be killed by him long enough to grab the chest and escape.
  • Originally ZombiU was going to involve tiny evil aliens based on the Rabbids. However they were eventually changed to zombies for both gameplay reasons and a tonal shift as development went on.


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