One; It wasn't in the original games, and
Two; No one likes staring at the back of their own head.
There's a way to configure and control the Chase Cam using the preferences file for each game. It goes like this:
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<chase_cam behind="1536" upward="0" rightward="0" flags="0"
damping="0.500000" spring="0.000000" opacity="1.000000"/>
behind is obviously the distance between the back of the player and the camera; it is relative to the direction of the player. When the camera comes in contact with a wall or staircase, it comes closer to the player to avoid clipping, however sometimes this fails and there is visible black space. I am assuming that 1536 is 1.536 WU, but I will need clarification on that (?).
upward is also intuitively the difference between the height of the camera and the player. Can the camera clip through ceilings? Also, is this too in World Milli-units?
rightward is not as intuitive. I am assuming that it is how rightward the camera is of the player, and that negative values can be used to place the camera leftward of the player (?). If this is the case, can the camera be placed in FRONT of the player, or BELOW the player? Again, World Milli-units?
These next three elements I have no clue what they do or what their nature is.
damping and spring sound like how the camera comes closer to the player when hitting a wall. Do these have max values? Is flags some kind of MML specific determinant and thus a way to control the chase cam through MML? Just conjecture.
If I have any understanding of visual elements, it's that opacity is basically the brightness or fullness of the camera image, 0.000000 being pitch black. This means that you could turn the chase cam into a dimmer or shutter screen while the HUD, terminals, and overlay map remain. This could be a very cool concept for a scenario.
Is there a document I can reference to that will tell me the nature of these? I've checked the HTMLs. Nothing about XML or chase cams. Once I know what I'm working with, I can figure out the optimal settings and do the minimal amount of backing out and saving. Also, if anyone has tinkered with this, post your values.