L'Abbaye des Morts Arrives on ZX Spectrum Next as a ByteFest 2026 Surprise

Locomalito's acclaimed gothic platformer L'Abbaye des Morts makes a surprise debut on the ZX Spectrum Next during ByteFest 2026 celebrations in Prague.

Locomalito's wonderfully gloomy L'Abbaye des Morts has found another machine to haunt, with a new ZX Spectrum Next edition making a surprise appearance around ByteFest 2026 in Prague. Originally created in 2010, L'Abbaye des Morts was deliberately styled after early European 8-bit computer games, so bringing it to hardware descended directly from the ZX Spectrum feels less like a port and more like sending the game home after a sixteen-year holiday.

The adventure follows Jean Raymond, a Cathar escaping persecution who takes refuge in an apparently abandoned church. Naturally, because videogames have never rewarded anybody for entering suspicious abandoned buildings, the sanctuary quickly becomes a maze of exploration, hazards and grim discoveries. The Spectrum Next edition adapts that deliberately old-fashioned design to a modern continuation of Sinclair's platform while retaining the stark atmosphere that made the original memorable.

Its arrival is tied to ByteFest 2026, which runs from September 25 through 28 at Toulcův dvůr in Prague. The long-running gathering celebrates vintage computers ranging across Sinclair, Commodore, Atari, Amstrad and other platforms, making it an unusually appropriate place for the release. The Spectrum Next occupies a fascinating niche in retro development: it is simultaneously compatible with a computing culture born in 1982 and capable of considerably more sophisticated software. L'Abbaye des Morts already looked like a lost Spectrum game when it wasn't one. Now reality has finally caught up with the disguise.