Carnivorous flightless birds, with tremendously large and powerful beaks, that can be encountered in various Dragon Quest titles. Great Beaks, and their palette-swapped cousins, debuted in Enix's 1988 Dragon Quest III: And Thus Into Legend . . . Japanese Nintendo Family Computer (Famicom) roleplaying video game (RPG), which was subsequently translated and released in North America (on March 12, 1992) as Dragon Warrior III for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES).

Today, Square-Enix publishes Dragon Quest games with the franchise's proper title, but, years ago, Simulation Publications/TSR had a tabletop RPG product on the shelves, also named DragonQuest, so, Enix wasn't able to release their games using that combination of words in the North American market, due to the resulting trademark conflict, hence the usage of the slightly different title of Dragon Warrior (isn't corporate litigation fun?)

Despite its moniker, this creature really isn't all that great (although, like any monster worth its salt, it will do its best to convince you otherwise). Physically, it's the weakest of the three feathered fiends that share Dragon Quest III's bipedal bird sprite, and the Great Beak exhibits no special abilities whatsoever, nor does it know any magic spells. Which is not to say that they aren't dangerous to battle, particularly for less experienced adventurers, but, in the context of Dragon Quest III's entire bestiary, they're more pigeon than eagle.

*****

Materials:
Newsprint, tissue paper, white paper, white glue, ink, and acrylic paint.

Dimensions:
2.8 cm (1.1") wide x 4.1 cm (1.6") long x 4.8 cm (1.9") high.

Time:
Two days; January 20th and 21st (2016).