Download the Demo

If I was into giving scores, this demo would get 98 percent. The download from www.cdmag.com was flawless - thanks to the Gigex server that allows you to resume downloads even if you have rebooted your PC. Installation was equally simple and painless.

The demo gives you 70 seconds to lose a police car that is chasing you. Until you get the hang of losing it you will feel like the prey in Terminator 2 - the police car seems to be a model of robotic determination. He will chase you and ram you till your car can take no more.

Graphics are great, and far better than in the Playstation version - the screenshots don't really do the demo justice, as they can't show the cars powersliding round a corner. There are only two weak points in the demo. The first is the sound - while the cars are OK, the police commentary is weak: "He's heading North .... He's hit another vehicle .... He's heading east" etc. The second weak point is in the controls - you cannot use joystick AND keyboard, it's either/or. This is fine if you have a 10 button joystick, but my TM FLCS is recognised by Windows as a 2 button stick, so I can't use all the views/options. I hope the full game will not have this problem and that I can use my Saitek R4 Wheel.

Evading the Police - 1

The easiest way to evade the police is to race to one of the two freeways that head into your part of town then head against the oncoming traffic. Drive down the centre of the road and watch as the police pile into the cars. Too easy. A variation is to choose any of the long straight roads and try to race away, avoiding the other cars. You will generally make a better go of it than the police.

Evading the Police - 2

The second option is to try to offset your better cornering ability against the police car's better acceleration by racing around city blocks as quickly as possible. You have the advantage in that you can choose to make your turn when the traffic is favourable, whereas the police car has to attempt to follow you even if a taxi has pulled out across his path in the meantime. This method is fun but risky - you never know when you are going to slide round a corner only to meet another vehicle head on.
 

Evading the Police - 3

The third option is to speed through the car park (marked with a P on the map) and out the other side. The police car either has problems following you through the concrete pillars or doesn't follow you in in the first place. Either way you stand a good chance of losing him.
 

How it works

The Police car will follow you if it sees you turn a corner, but if you manage to turn before the police car has sight of you he will choose 50/50 and you stand a good chance of getting away. You will know when this has happened because his scan cone (see the map) will turn from red to white.

The other way to lose him is to get so far ahead of him that he can no longer see you. This is what happens if you are racing down the freeway and he crashes.

The full game promises us TWO police cars in the Getaway game, that's gonna be tough!