The Dark Queen of Mortholme
What if you were the final evil boss who must be defeated by the relentless hero who gets infinite attempts at beating you, coming back ever stronger and having learned to adapt to each of your abilities? That is the primse of The Dark Queen of Mortholme, a single-room platformer narrative game that connects opposing journeys ever closer.
Warning: this review contains spoilers
You are The Dark Queen herself, sitting at the throne of your evil empire, when your palace is invaded by a weakling. It is your duty to strike down this measly human, who you can kill with all of your three grand abilities, but why bother making any effort? He's shot down in a single strike anyway. You burn his body with a snap of your fingers.
He quickly appears again through the same door, leaving you baffled, but unamused. It happens again and again, but each time he adapts a little further to your attack: he will now roll off your ungodly strike, jump over your swift body throw and time his movements against the long-range, area-of-effect burning cicle you can muster, although it takes him many attempts.
Questioned by the hero, you slowly become aware of yourself: What are you if you are not a queen? Where can you go if you are forced to move? Why do you stay at all? You get more attached to the confident hero as you fight. You even stop burning his body through a snap of your fingers, throughly embracing him before his soul is released again.
As any good adventurer, he powers up, finding a sword that can damage you, a bow he can use when close combat is too risky, and even magic that protects him from your instakilling ultimate form (which I will leave out to entice you to try a playthrough). Despite your best endeavours, he eventually lands the final hit and you succumb.
Despite your death, you will be eternal in his memory and in the memories of those who have had the awful luck of having to deal with the nightmare you've represented since the beginning of times.
However, there are actually multiple endings. Can you find them?
You can download The Dark Queen of Mortholme on itch.io at https://qwertyprophecy.itch.io/mortholme