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Screen shots last updated 3/21/98 |
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Cind-E can be played from a first-person POV (like Doom or Quake); from a second-person POV (like in flight simulators or the new Mario 64(tm) game); or a third-person POV (like in Zelda, but extruded into three dimensions). Here is the way the game looks from a third-person POV: |
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Your ship, the Rover, is shown in the lower-right corner. You can manipulate the ship by flying it up or down and throughout the entire Cavern. From this point-of-view, you get an excellent overview of the cavern and what is known as "situation awareness." The caverns have no light sources in them, so the view you are presented with is always a synthetic view produced by translating the data from Cind-E's sensors into something you can see on your display. Therefore, Cind-E can create any viewpoint at any time. |
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"Second-person POV" is where you are following a short distances from your ship, as is done in many flight simulators. In C.I.N.D.-E 1.4, the view stays aligned along the North axis, thus increasing your sense of locality and giving a better sense of the relationships between objects. This lets you see your ship and also some of the environment, but your view, of course, is limited to the portion of the world currently in your display. Here is a typical second-person POV view: |
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"First-person POV", of course, is familiar to all Doom / Quake fans. The first-person POV gives you the most exciting, visceral experience, but also limits your situational awareness the most. Since C.I.N.D.-E 1.4 is more about strategy than twitch-factor, this view should only be used for exploring and close-up examination of objects when the coast is clear. Here is the same view as the one directly above, but from the first-person POV: |
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Cind-E 1.4 has been in development for over three years now, and so a number of problems in 3D games have been uncovered and solved. It's generally more fun to see your character (ship, in this case) in 3rd person (as in Tomb Raider or Mario 64), than simply having a 1st person view as in Doom. You get a better sense of location and a better feel for your character if you see yourself on the screen. But once you make the jump to third person, all sorts of new problems occur. It becomes difficult to tell when someone is in front of you or behind you. Targeting is difficult. In C.I.N.D.-E 1.4, these problems are overcome because CindE can help you aim, target and destroy multiple high-threat targets. |
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