‘Faces’ Stacks Up

Unlike many arcade games, “Faces” does not encourage you to destroy worlds, and errors do not result in gory deaths. This addicting and overall quite pleasant little game could foster a mild curiosity about the faces caricatured on the screen, and by playing you do your part to improve U.S.-Soviet trade relations.

Spectrum HoloByte’s “Faces . . . Tris III” is the third offering from Soviet designer and programmer Alexey Pajitnov. It builds on the theme of his earlier two games, “Tetris” and “Weltris.” All three games use a deceptively simple stacking technique to assemble coherent objects and earn points.

Not so strangely, the objects assembled in “Faces” are just that--faces. Faces of modern world leaders--Indira Gandhi, Margaret Thatcher, Mikhail Gorbachev. Faces of science--Newton, Einstein, Galileo. Faces from history--Sitting Bull, Frederick Douglass, George Washington Carver. Faces of fantasy--Wolfman, Frankenstein, Dracula. And more. Lots more.

Faces are built from the chin up. Chins, mouths, noses, eyes, foreheads. As you begin playing, pairs of small rectangles bearing brightly colored chins start gently drifting down from the sky. A pair of mouths follow. Great--more than likely, they land on the chins. Now what? More chins. More chins? You don’t need more chins. You want noses!

You get the idea. The faces parts start falling faster than East European governments, and the unused features start piling up.

Tension grows, and suddenly you are hooked.

Difficulty levels are nicely graduated to allow for novice to advanced players. Beginning players, children and adults probably will be comfortable at the lower levels, while even teen-age Nintendo aces might enjoy the challenges of the higher playing levels.

FACESRating: * *

* Fair

* * Good

* * * Very Good

* * * * Excellent

IBM PC or compatible; 512K/ 640K VGA; Tandy 1000 or Ad-Lib sound optional. List: $39.95