video game review : Uniracers, <i> For Super NES by Nintendo, $49.95 </i>

Most video games are variations on a theme--a battle against space aliens, the quest for a throne, hand-to-hand martial arts combat or video versions of popular movies.

Then there’s Uniracers.

This deceptively challenging cart features racing unicycles. Sixteen of them.

Now that took some thinking.

And they don’t only race against each other and the clock. They have to perform stunts while zooming around tricky abstract courses that reverse direction, drop off into space and give you clues on what to expect by the color of various track segments.

Uniracers is one of those games that’s easy to play but very hard to master. It requires concentration, quick fingers and a reasonable amount of imagination.

Three track types are available--race, circuit and stunt. Racetracks are the fastest, and you have to be the fastest to win. Circuit tracks are similar, but you go around and around instead of from one end to the other. Stunt tracks are designed to show off your repertoire of tricks.

It’s that repertoire that separates the real racers from the wanna-bes. Mashing buttons, the D-pad and L-R flippers in specific combinations will make your unicycle leap from the track and spin, twist, roll or flip. You collect points based on the difficulty of the stunt, and, in some cases, a properly done stunt can provide the burst of speed needed to put you ahead of your opponent.

Landing on the seat instead of the wheel is a wipeout and earns you no points, no matter how expertly you performed the stunt.

You also get a number of ways to play, including against the CPU, against a friend or in the versus mode, where the winner keeps playing until he or she loses.

You also have a league option, which lets a bunch of people form up to six leagues of individual unicycles--a maximum of eight in each league. You select your league from the menu of 16 cycles, with names like Ken and Amy.

In single-player mode, you race against the Ghost Unicycle, controlled by the computer.

From the menu, you select one of eight tours, each harder than the previous one. Then, you pick one of five tracks, with all three types represented. You must complete all five before you can move on to another tour. And you have to complete them three times at increasingly difficult levels of play--bronze, silver and gold.

The tracks are bright ribbons of color, but there’s nothing random about the rainbow hues. They all mean something.

For instance, blue and green segments mean a normal track. But when widely spaced red segments show up, it means the track is about to change directions. This is important, because most races are won by pretty small margins, and any time wasted heading in the wrong direction can trash your chances of victory.

When those red sections are close together, it means you should not attempt any stunts. Blue and yellow segments mean you’re on the homestretch, so floor it. Red and yellow means you’re lost. And a black-and-white section means the race is just about over.

The cycles themselves are cute. Sorry, that’s the only way to describe them. They have personality--bowing when they win, hanging their seats in shame at a loss. Cute.

Some advice: Don’t miss way points. Unless you pass them all, your lap won’t be recorded, you’ll get a lousy time and you’ll lose. That’s bad.

But that may be the only bad thing about Uniracers. It’s a colorful, entertaining and amusing cart, lighthearted and a lot of fun.