In a new interview with IGN, Koshi Nakanishi, the director of Resident Evil Requiem Evil, and its producer, Masato Kumazawa, sat down to discuss the game‘s key “stalker” enemy—a persistent, giant-sized monster who continuously hounds the player throughout the story.
As this lineage includes such franchise darlings as Mr. X, Nemesis, and the ever-popular Lady Dimitrescu, designing a new, iconic monster for the series is no small feat. So, what did they come up with this time? Make way for the tentatively named “Big Mama.”
Sharing a similar color and body shape to the Pale Lady from Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, a pair of segmented, lobster-like eyes, and a face similar to that one demon who made Buffy believe she was in a mental institution, Resident Evil‘s new creation is at the very least a well-studied amalgam of uncanny imagery, if perhaps a bit too similar to “The Mother” from Zack Cregger‘s Barbarian. Indeed, as Nakanishi states in the article, the character’s placeholder name at Capcom was “Big Mama,” though as the director notes, “we’re taking all kinds of suggestions” for something more appropriate down the line.
Admitting the difficulty of designing a new enemy “amongst the crowd of iconic characters” Resident Evil is known for, Nakanishi revealed it was his idea to make her appreciably larger than her franchise antecedents. In his own words, “The character was originally smaller, but I figured let’s scale her up and I think that was the right answer because then her incredible size suddenly becomes overwhelming and she literally stands out from the pack of stalker enemies. The base concept was an enemy that you would know in an instant, and when you glance you know, like, ‘that’s not right, I don’t want any part of this, this is bad.’
As physically imposing as she may be, “Big Mama” shares a trait common to any monster worth their salt: a deadly allergy to bright light. According to Nakanashi, “I wanted to bring a slightly new twist on the idea of exploring the so-called mansion-type environments that are typical to Resident Evil games. Rather than having a specific location that’s safe or unsafe, you will have noticed that a lot of the rooms have light switches and lamps and things in them. So I think it’s more to let you have a chance to create your own room that in a given situation that particular creature is afraid of the light and won’t come in.”
Unfortunately, powered light sources are naturally unreliable—doubly so in old mansions with faulty wiring. “I think with horror you need to establish the rules and then you need to break them to add even more fear and anxiety,” he states. “So you figure out how to stay safe, and then you realize that it’s not as safe as you thought. It is a way to just bring a next level of fear to the experience. You think you have it, and then we pull the rug from your feet. So that’s exactly my intention.”
As to who or what “Big Mama” will reveal herself to be in the game remains a mystery, but fan speculation online theorizes she may be a monstrous mutation of Alyssa Ashcroft, the mother of the games’ protagonist, Grace. In the interview, Nakanishi would neither confirm nor deny these suspicions, deflecting, “We’re very much aware of the discussion and speculation about this kind of thing and as a player, whenever I’m playing a game, I love to get involved in that stuff, but I don’t think it’s fair for me to weigh in on those debates as a developer.”
Fortunately, the identity of “Big Mama” will eventually be revealed when Resident Evil Requiem releases on February 27, 2026.