Back in the heyday of long-haired Japanese horror ghouls (circa late 1990s to early 2000s), one game managed to bring the horrific ghost trope into the gaming industry: F.E.A.R. Standing for First Encounter Assault Recon, its main star was a ghoulishm enigmatic ghost woman named Alma.
She's the poster monster of the F.E.A.R. franchise and would go on to be relevant in all three games. With F.E.A.R.'s plot becoming more convoluted than even Resident Evil or its Japanese horror inspirations, it can sometimes be challenging to keep track of Alma, who she is, or what she wants. Thus, it's time to take a good look back at what exactly made her creepy, apart from the general appearance.
10 She's Inspired By Samara/Sadako
Those who are already horror film buffs by the time of the early 2000s will surely know where F.E.A.R.'s developers borrowed Alma's form, personality, and even her powers. She's a more terrifying and more destructive version of Sadako or Samara (US version).
Either of those two ghouls originated from the 1998 Japanese horror film, Ring or Ringu. Like Sadako, the bulk of Alma's powers are psychic in nature, meaning she can kill people just by willing it. Often though, she doesn't do it outright as she prefers to control and torment her victims, being a more vengeful and bloodthirsty monster.
9 She's Extremely Intelligent At A Young Age
Looking at Alma's history, it's safe to say that she's an even more competent psychic than Sadako or Samara. Alma, as early as her birth, was already teeming with limitless psychic powers. Her potential was such that a wealthy arms company held her as a weapon and experimented on her.
Alma, at age five, grew tired of the painful and harrowing experiments. She even failed her test results on purpose after finishing all of them with flying colors prior. When the tests didn't stop, she moved on to a new plan: to psychically manipulate everyone around her.
8 Alma Wasn't Originally A Monster
Eventually, the arms company, Armacham, caught on to Alma's plans. They realized that the only reason Alma didn't murder was because she was still a child, and her morals were still intact. Sadly, Armacham pushed their abuse further and put Alma in regular coma episodes to keep her powerless.
This went on from her childhood to her adult years. Eventually, Alma knew nothing else than the cold metallic walls of a lab and the disgusted faces of her handlers. In a sense, Armacham created its own monster. Instead of raising Alma as a child with emotional and psychological needs, they treated her as a tool and guinea pig.
7 They Impregnated Her At A Young Age
Horrifically, Armacham didn't stop with forced the comatose state. They knew all along that Alma would turn out to be an unstable individual (who'd have guessed?) so the first solution they could think of was to set up a replacement or a successor.
As soon as Alma was able to carry a child, they impregnated her. At age 16, she was already a mother of two — one of whom inherited her immense psychic powers. What Armacham didn't factor in was Alma basically unlocking the secret to immortality.
6 She's Practically Immortal
As soon as the second child became a potential successor, Armacham pulled the plug on Alma and left her emaciated and weakened body to die and rot. With all their experiments, they somehow didn't learn that Alma's greatest asset was her mind — which, it turns out, has the capacity to linger as psychic energy.
Hence, despite her physical shell perishing as a normal human body would, Alma never disappeared. Instead, she became a near-omnipotent form of psychic energy that can play tricks on the mind and assume several illusory forms. It also stands within reason that she can possess and control physical bodies.
5 Alma Has Three Notable Forms
Alma interchangeably appears in three forms all throughout the three main F.E.A.R. games. All of them are eerie and nightmare-inducing. The first one is her pallid child form, where she wears a red dress and sports long straight hair which covers most of her face.
The second is presumably her true and current form, which is that of an emaciated woman with slimy skin and greasy long hair. The third is an illusion where she appears as a voluptuous and healthy (but still ghoulish) woman in order to seduce someone. In any case, all three forms are up to no good.
4 She Looks For Potential Mates Among Her Victims
Why would Alma conjure up an illusory version of herself that's more attractive than the rest? Because she's still apparently human and has human urges. Most of Alma's enemies and hunters are male, and at times, she even tries to see if any of them can be potential mates for her future brood.
She found plenty of viable candidates in the Dark Signal psychic strike team that Armacham commissioned. The kicker is that she's rather picky with the gene pool, and ended up killing most of Dark Signal's members, particularly those who she deemed unworthy of reproducing with her.
3 Alma Became Romantically Obsessed
Alma did eventually find the perfect candidate among the Dark Signal members, and the poor bloke is none other than F.E.A.R. 2's protagonist, Michael Becket. A lot of players likely didn't notice in the first playthrough, but Alma actually kept throwing herself at Becket. He was also the reason why she assumed another, more physically attractive form.
Alma grew obsessed with Becket, and it was even explained in the game that she developed something romantic for him. Unfortunately, she never really knew how to be a normal human or communicate and instead went by her instinct, thereby trying to violate Becket at any chance she gets.
2 She's Technically Not The Main Antagonist
Despite the constant psychological trauma she dealt to the players and to the protagonists, one technically can't consider Alma as the main villain. If anything, she's the most circumstantial victim in the whole series. The real villains were the executives and power players in Armacham, who turned Alma into what she is.
In fact, Alma wasn't even trying to hurt any of the F.E.A.R. game protagonists. The first game's hero was actually her son, the second game was the baby daddy, and the third game was either of her two sons again. This kind of dysfunctional family dynamic makes Alma's motivations and allegiance questionable.
1 She's Been Referenced In A Successful Horror Film
While Alma didn't have the same impact as some of gaming's most iconic villains, she did get a reference from a highly successful horror film, The Cabin in the Woods. In it, a ghoulish girl was portrayed with psychic abilities and was able to vaporize her poor victim.
During the act of killing her security guard victim, the audience can even hear the little girl singing "Hush Little Baby." Apparently, this scene was a callback to how Alma often killed Armacham's security guards and her handlers.