The default branch is develop and has been for several years now. Unless explicitly cloning the master branch, then it should be develop you are using. If the master branch was specifically cloned (or checked out) then I would expect quite a few things to break once packages were downloaded (as many packages have changed)

If the zip file of spacemacs config was downloaded from http://spacemacs.org that does contain master branch from about 2 years ago. So I would consider that option unsupported.

The clone command on the http://spacemacs.org website will download the develop branch

git clone  ~/.emacs.d

The spacemacs install instructions on Practicalli Spacemacs should be up to date, (september 2023 last updated) and they cover XDG and standard config locations, as well as how to use the Practicalli Spacemacs user config https://practical.li/spacemacs/install-spacemacs/

I think the error posted at the start of the thread is related to changes that occurred in the evil packages over the last year, which definitely wont be in master if that is what is actually been used.

If develop branch is being used. I suggest moving any Spacemacs user configuration files or directories, e.g. $HOME/.spacemacs or $HOME/.spacemacs.d or the XDG location, or any $SPACEMACSDIR file. Then start Emacs and let spacemacs create a new user config and see if the issue still remains. Starting Emacs this way should prompt a question from Spacemacs about Evil vs Holy mode (select evil) and if to use the standard or bare distribution (select standard).

There are more ideas in the troubleshooting guide. https://practical.li/spacemacs/install-spacemacs/troubleshooting/

You are right, I'm on develop

From https://www.spacemacs.org/#spacemacs

git clone  ~/.emacs.d

I should have made it clear that I did a really fresh installation. I did not copy over my old .spacemacs file at all. And I selected evil and standard installation

I had p;roblems with 29.x versions before that's why I suspect it might cause those problems. I might try 28.2 to see if it makes any difference

It could just be a corrupted package download or a bad compile of the evil packages. In which case I would delete the evil packages or .elc files from the evil package directories in .emacs.d/elpa/29.2/develop/

Many people also recommend usinghttps://github.com/d12frosted/homebrew-emacs-plusfor MacOSX (this is what I have been using on a Mac since Emacs 29)

I am not using native compilation on the Mac and it seems to run okay without it. (AMD chipset on Mac, not intel)

I have m3 pro. I'll try emacs plus and fresh installation

Seems to be working better now - thanks!