Dark Queen of Samobor is an upcoming 2.5D action adventure from the Osijek development team Downtown Game, and it has also received a demo version on Steam that I tried out and I bring you my impressions.
The story is inspired by the works of August Šenoa and the myth of Barbara Celjska, whose voice is embodied by the legend of the Osijek theater scene and the prima donna of HNK Osijek, Sandra Lončarić, who celebrated 30 years on stage on April 17, 2026. Barbara is remembered in history as the Black Queen, associated with many legends, including one where she gave the Zagreb fortress Medvedgrad to the devil, ruled by her brother Fridrik, to save the city from Turkish attacks. The plot of Dark Queen of Samobor is set after the Crusades, and our character is a knight returning home to his girlfriend.
This demo takes us through the first of five chapters called Ambush of the Black Feathers, and it takes about half an hour to play. What I think the game shines the most in is the gameplay, which is a combination of side-scrolling hack and slash and puzzle game. The demo version contained three puzzles that I must admit were not easy and I accumulated quite a number of deaths on them. The puzzle that took me the most time involved using a time-slowing skill to avoid two walls with spikes, and since this is the very start of the game, your meter doesn't last long, so you need to think carefully about when to slow down time to reach the fire that resets your meter to its initial state and how to coordinate pressing the shift key to roll forward.
I also have to commend the game's authors, as the demo version featured not just one type of enemy but also skeletons and two types of dark creatures with crow masks that, unlike the skeletons, can deal damage if you don't intercept their attack in time. I must say I didn't encounter any major problems or bugs except for one where my character got stuck in a jump and couldn't fall so I could restart the level.
On our journey, we will also come across various items that we can collect, and through text and Barbara's narration, we get more information about the background of the story. At certain moments, the camera also switches from a side-scrolling perspective to a bird's-eye view, which at that moment resembles games like Diablo, Path of Exile, and even Titan Quest. Another strong point of this title is the excellent music, which is very calming, and becomes increasingly tense during battles, credited to the local composer Dalibor Grubačević.
If you like this style of game and perhaps want to help in its development, you can do so through the Kickstarter platform, and you will also be rewarded for your donation.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nFE8uv_HlDE
