Product Reviews

Certain things in life have an incontestable appeal. Most people would be quite chuffed with a hot air balloon ride, or might even fancy taking the controls of a jet plane - but what we surely all aspire to is to take off and fly around the world like an ethereal spirit. Eingana promises to deliver just that - at least, subject to the constraints of your PC.

This 3D replica of the Earth is full of quirks, and is ultimately pointless, but it's also clearly a labour of love and often incredibly beautiful. With the use of some clever graphical jiggery-pokery to combine satellite photography with 3D rendering, the views that Eingana can generate are quite breathtaking. You'll find the world's mountains, valleys, deserts and oceans reproduced here in all their glory. Add plants, animals, clouds and spectacular sunsets, and with the help of the program's camera function,

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you have some fantastic desktop wallpaper in the making.

Even more rewarding is the ability to roam freely around the globe. Fly from thousands of miles above the Earth to ground level in a matter of seconds, or find the remote island where you once went on holiday. You can toggle place names on and off, along with a compass, location coordinates and a globe showing the position of the sun, which you can drag around when you need to shed a little light on a part of the globe.

Eingana isn't without its frustrations, though. Certain landmarks and the odd European city are represented, but if you've got your heart set on visiting a particular town, you'll probably be disappointed. Chances are, you'll find nothing but barren landscape. Many of Eingana's terrains are a good deal more bare than in real life, too - and for some reason, the poles are completely inaccessible. There are over 100 species of animal to find, but most places only offer the odd shrub for company. Most frustrating, though, is the load Eingana places on PCs - even on the very fastest new machines, the animation is seriously jerky.

The thing to remember here, however, is that Eingana is an ongoing project. It'll become more accurate as updates are released, and with any luck the next PC we get round to buying will cope with its demands. It may be worth waiting to see how Eingana shapes up before you buy it - but even now, this is a remarkable, enjoyable piece of software.