The Abbey

In this game, you are tasked with finding treasure and investigating evil in an old abbey. As you explore, you find things like casks of pigs blood, evidence of violence, and a library that is a real maze. Eventually, I realized that this all seems familiar, because it's based on The Name of the Rose! When I found the 'finis africae' it was clear confirmation. There's a lot more added, and it doesn't follow the plot of the book, so it's not an adaptation, but it's pretty clearly inspired by it.

I played this the way I do many older adventures: I wandered around seeing how much I could achieve for a half hour or so, then used the walkthrough. For about half of the game I thought, "wow, this isn't that bad. Just mapping every room and taking everything you see should solve the majority of the puzzles". Then I got to a puzzle or two that I think I never would have solved on my own, but Rovarsson's review states that he solved it by dying and someone else said something similar, so that seems fair.

The overall atmosphere is spooky and fun, just like the source material it was based on, but intercut with silly jokes in a way reminiscent of other games in that post-Infocom and pre-Inform era (like Unnkulia).

Don't expect anything to be described. You could find (hypothetically) a miniature alien with a tattoo of the Queen of England in the middle of kissing a moldy tuna sandwich and the game would say:
'>X ALIEN

You see nothing interesting.'

Most actions will say it's not understood. So for most of the game you'll be fine. There are a few actions near the end that are more complex, though.

Overall, a fun adventure and neat to see a game from an era that's not as common as others.

I had to play using the online link.