If there is one redeeming factor to this game, it would be the plot. The game begins promisingly enough as you stumble across a wagon train that has been savaged by vampires. As you are a dedicated lone gunslinger fighting for truth, justice and the American way, you promise to rescue the kidnaped son of one of the wagon train's occupants. The nearest civilized area is a mining town named Silverload. The town's citizens are a strange lot, though. They deny all knowledge of a kidnaped child and make you feel as welcome as an American in Iran. Though the town is small, there are numerous locations to search and search and search for many areas and inventory items are impossible to spot. Three times I have attempted to finish Silverload, with a walkthrough at my side, and I have yet to suffer through the conclusion of this game. The music and the sound effects are a mixed lot. Sometimes they are there, and other times scenes that had music earlier are now silent. This is apparently a subtle attempt to test your auditory abilities. An old-west town populated by ghouls, werewolves and vampires could have been a lot of fun where it not off put by the jerky animation, incoherent puzzles, bad interface and horrendous lip-synching. It is these few minor details that separate Silverload from the gaming classics.

It is indeed unfortunate that Vic Tokai is no longer with us. Their idea of what constituted an adventure game could have added many more plaques to the walls of the Dungeon of Shame. But rest assured, somewhere out there, at this very moment, there is a devoted programmer being led astray by his marketing department, unknowingly creating a future entry for the Dungeon of Shame. Time will be the final judge.

What's up next for the "Dungeon of Shame"? How about a game that numerous readers have nominated as the worse of all-time. A game that lets you travel from the farthest reaches of space to the perimeter of a black hole in your wallet that has just been suckered out of 40 bucks. For in space no one can hear you scream ... at your computer as you suffer through more mind-numbing dialogue. We'll save the name of this classic for the next column. In the meantime, if you have any games you would like to nominate, drop me an e-mail and if enough readers designate the same game, I'll give it a consideration.