Ossuary

Oh no, not again. Another necromancer has set up home in the village Ossuary, the impressive underground cemetery in which the villagers have interred their dead for centuries. Not only has he animated the bodies of the dead to serve as his friends, but he has also enchanted and enlarged the once natural creatures who had made their home under the vaults, and has them wandering around as guard animals and pets. All this does nothing for the dignity of funerals and other ceremonies the villagers are still trying to hold down there.

So they've asked you, a young travelling hero trying to make your fortune, to help rid them of this nuisance. What you lack in experience you make up for in enthusiasm and willingness to put your life at risk for... well, for gold, basically. And as your reward the villagers will give you any treasure that you can carry out of the Ossuary with you. And being an adventuring hero, you can carry a lot.

Every game of Ossuary will be different. The 24 levels of the Ossuary are laid out at random. While each successive level will be harder, the appearance of different kinds of creatures, and the weapons and other items you will need to deal with them, may be earlier or later from game to game. Your hero will be different too: sometimes he'll be more proficient with a sword, while in other games, better at magic. So you'll be able to play this again and again.

Released 18th March 2013

Game News

Play Cyningstan Games On-line (24 Mar 13): A new feature has been added to the Cyningstan web site. Our games can now be played here on-line, right in your desktop web browser! On each game's own page there is a new panel, in which an embedded Spectrum emulator now loads the game for you and allows you to try it out without any download or game installation necessary. (read more...)

Ossuary: a new game for the ZX Spectrum (18 Mar 13): Today the ZX Spectrum has another game in its library: Ossuary. Descend into an underground burial complex to rid it of the necromancer who has taken up home there, much to the annoyance of the local villagers who still want to use it to inter their dead. Work your way down through 24 levels of monsters and treasure to reach your enemy. Nobody has made it yet. Nor, probably, will you. (read more...)

Play On-line

Click here to play on-line version courtesy of qaop, a Spectrum emulator for Java. Performance may differ from a real ZX Spectrum or an emulator running on your device. Ctrl and cursor keys act as a kempston joystick.

More Information

Ossuary runs on all Sinclair ZX Spectrums and their Amstrad successors, from the Sinclair 16K model to the 128K Amstrad +3. Saving games requires a cassette deck. Ossuary is incompatible with some hardware devices that reserve areas of the Spectrum's memory for their own use: see the instruction sheet for details.

Load the game with the command:

LOAD ""

When the game starts, you will can select your control method: keyboard or Kempston joystick. The keys for the game are: A - fire, S - up, X - down, N - left, M - right.

You can hold down FIRE to bring up the menu. Use LEFT and RIGHT to move through the options, and release FIRE to select.

Acknowledgement: thanks to Roy van den Berg and World of Spectrum forum members deadpan666, jp, LCD and Yerzmyey for helping test this game.

Screen Shots

Title screen

Beginning a new adventure

Swordplay with snakes and spiders

Using magic against the undead

Files to Download