I should preface this by saying this is my first true Grand Theft Auto experience, but I have had some interesting encounters with the police in GTA V.

First, I think the world is naturally a great environment for randomly encountering the cops. It's a great improvement on just having the cops on your radar at all times, now I have to look around first before I steal a car or etc. Second, I feel like the time period I have to hide from the cops is extremely long, and I'm always uncertain how much longer I will have to dodge them.

Finally, I have had some of the worst luck with cops seeming to spawn at strange places while I'm running from them. I have heard some complaints of how easy it is to lose them when you go off road, but I have had some issues of them showing up out of nowhere off road at incredibly illogical (and inconvenient) places.

What about you? What are your impressions on notoriety and escaping the police?

My problem has been them chasing me for no good reason. I had a car collision, which resulted in the guy getting out of his car and blasting on me. As I hid from him I suddenly received 1 star, long after the collision. So I ran because fuck man I didn't do anything wrong. I'm the victim here. Then I received ANOTHER star for running.

Is it because I'm black?! Whole system is racist, man.

For me it's been a matter of finding a nice alley or parking lot to hide out in and I'm generally safe. Obviously I move to another one when I see cops converge on my hiding spot. This seems to be the fastest, most painless way to get it done.

I haven't had cops appear in random off-road places yet, but I also have just been hanging out in Los Santos.

@brodehouse: You know what you did. The police didn't like it one bit.

I haven't really had any issues with losing the police eventually, although I would have liked the timer to either show the drain progress more clearly, or just drain faster.

Sometimes i have real trouble getting away, and other times its super easy. its weird.

@earlessshrimp: RODNEY KING! RODNEY KING! RODNEY KING!

@brodehouse: Hey, you shouldn't have let the guy shoot you. That pisses cops off more than anything. There isn't any racism! I can prove it!

I really enjoy it; allows me to better create the "running through backyards to hide from the cops" fantasy.

That made me think of this scene in this movie.

I've only done it once but it felt like it took way to long to end. It felt like I was playing an old game.

I enjoyed it actually but only because 1) I was on foot and 2) I was in the ghetto. Something about hopping chain link fences and ducking into garages and running full tilt down dirty back alleys, overturning garbage cans and squeezing between crowded, low-income tract housing until the police get tired and decide to go have donuts instead felt _breathtakingly real_. The fact that it played out like that purely procedurally is kind of incredible.

It probably won't hold up when I'm shooting rocket launchers in the Financial District and people are just walking about like it ain't no thing.

I drove the bulldozer (the one with wheels bigger than a truck, not the mini dozer) all the way from the quarry all the way to my purchased garage in hopes of saving it. An hour later I made it just to get in a fender bender. OK I crushed the entire car with 2% of the wheel and a cop saw this. Hoping to lose the cop I climbed a ladder and hid on a roof. That tactic did not work and a few minutes later I had 3 helicopters and police coming down on rope to kill me. I did not give them the pleasure and dove to my death.

PS: The traffic jam I caused driving that thing all the way to the city was awesome.

A cop ran into me and I got one star out of it.

Generally, I find that getting away from them is much easier, but once I am hidden, I have no idea how the game determines when your star level disappears. It seems very inconsistent

I like way they handled it in this game the vision cones thing is a cool way to do it. You can have some real tense moments if you find a good hiding spot and the police are right by you searching.

I love the cone system. Feels great to hide in an alley or someones garden!

I have not been caught by the cops yet, but I agree it seems like a lot show up out of nowhere or see you when they shouldn't. Then again I bet if they didn't just pop up you would escape most cases in under 40 seconds thus it would be too easy.

It's been a while since GTA4 but I remember getting screwed by the system repeatedly, so far 5's been actually fair with the police's line of sight.

It's a lot more fun in this game I think, since there's no real radius it's actually feasible to hide somewhere instead of driving away as fast as you can. I like the vision cone mechanic after the stars start blinking too.

Oftentimes I'll just turn a corner and hide rather than speed away now, and the freedom to do that instead of having to outrace the police is a lot more fun imo.

So I think this question can be split into two issues: How notoriety is achieved, and what escaping is like.

Escaping has been fine for me, I like that I get bitchslapped dead relatively shortly after engaging in a fire fight, it made me much more cautious about facing the cops who are chasing me. I'm driving like a pro so I'm escaping the cops fine. My favorite part is when I escape the cop cars but the helicopter stays on my tail, so I park on the side, get out, shoot the helicopter crew with my SMG which breaks the police's sight on me, and then lay low until they're gone.

However, Rockstar has gone FULL RETARD when it comes to becoming wanted. Read Dead Redemption's "witness" system was such a fucking innovation, it's a shame that they dropped it in V. If you beat up a guy with your hands after he started it, once he hits the floor you get a wanted star, which for some reason turns into two stars shortly thereafter, and cop cars and helicopters start FLYING AT YOU from everywhere even if you're at the summit of a fucking mountain.

Also I'm still trying to get arrested, but even the smallest crime of one star gets me shot to dead by cops.

The chases are amazing, but the way you become wanted is seriously ridiculous.

Oh, you mean in the game...

Once I get a 2 star it's easier and quicker to just die and respawn. It's never been fun to get away, but I find it really frustrating in this game as I'm perfectly hidden but it takes forever for it to go away. It really needs some kind of countdown or progress bar to help show how close you are from it going away.

Too easy for me at this point. Outrun, hide off road/underbridge/behind building. That was with 3 star wanted level.

I always figured

1star: simple to outrun

2star: lots of units communicating to stop you (i.e. roadblocks)

3star: Helicopters added only to track you and very very tough to outrun gops.

4star: Helicopters now shooting as well, FIB units, all that jazz

5star: Tanks and ALLLLLLLLL the big guns.

I always figured that would be a solid system of wanted levels. Reserve first 3 for realistic crimes, and 4-5 for mayhem.

I am trying to steal that FBI car with guns for a mission and get 3 stars right away for that I just just cannot escape!!! Even when I hide in crazy places their cones seem to be able to see through walls and bridges. Been stuck on this mission for awhile now I get so frustrated at this game!

Sometimes easy, other times not. As long as you change lanes and escape their line of sight, you just have to hide. Which usually work.

Still waiting to get the game, but I did see a free roam of this. Dudes punched a guy on top of Mt. Chilliad, got a one star wanted level and then suddenly cop cars were really close to them (though one did manage to ramp off the side of the mountain and disappear forever). Getting wanted levels seems kinda sucky with how little leeway you get, but losing them seems fun.

Though I'll have to wait a day or two to find out myself.

Horrible. Fuck tha Police.

I think the waiting is a little too long. Occassionly I also experience cop cars pupping up when I have almost lost the cops then they see me and the whole thing drags on way longer than it should have and it can become a bit of a nuisance if I just want to move on with the story.

Escaping at 4+ stars is nearly impossible unless you can make it to a train tunnel. 2+ helis keep vision on you constantly, and even if you shoot them down they respawn and magically find you again before the wanted level fades, not to mention the police and FIB vans going crazy for you the whole time.

The level 1-3 stars feel pretty good though, breaking cops line of sight and hiding is pretty awesome, wish there was a timer that told you when you were safe though. Also annoying when you're driving away and out of the cop's vision and you see a cop randomly happen to spawn in front of you and it decides to turn around every time.

Would be nice if the cop cones were dynamic so they were blocked by buildings and stuff, so you knew if you were really safe hiding down a hill or behind a fence or something.

My one last complaint would be that the police are able to instantly make you once you commit a crime. If I shoot a dude with no police around and I get a wanted level, even if I jump in a car and drive away, as soon as a cop sees me he knows I'm the guy. I wish you could blend in and escape the crimescene before they figure out who you are. Let them have to talk to witnesses (It'd be cool if there was a proper witness system of some kind too, so I can silence them and escape). Basically there has been a lot of Assassin's Creed games since the last GTA and it'd be nice to have a deeper notoriety system.

It's way easier that it has been in previous games. It makes it less of a hassle when I'm attempting to get from one place or another and I hit a cop.

I mean i've had a few frustrating moments with it, but i actually like that its hard. The cones are pretty good. I've had it glitch and they saw me through a fence when i was clearly on the other side of it, but aside from that. It's a good system, better than past games at least.

honestly the only time i've been frustrated with it, was when i've gotten a star on accident mid-mission and then i have to drive all over to lose them, just to deliver a weed van.

I'm still trying to figure out the ultra-frustrating notoriety system. Sometimes I can gun down a crowd of two or three people without any notice from the authorities, and then other times I get two stars immediately for punching a dude in the face. It's easy enough to lose the cops, I just wish the game was a little more consistent when applying wanted levels.

It's like I'm reliving parts of the film Drive over and over again. Not sure if hiding under an overpass is what gets helicopters off me, but it sure feels awesome when they don't notice me.

Tell me about it, it's such a damn shame for an otherwise stellar game.

Between the super fragile health bar and the super aggressive notoriety system that doesn't allow you to sneeze, I'm neither fucking around nor going on rampages, so I don't die and lose so much money, or get cops chasing me and also probably die.

And this is why we all play Grand Theft Auto, to watch our health and behave on the street, right? Thanks GTAV :/

In the city I found it a bit frustrating as the cone field of vision isn't perfect and will oftentimes see right through walls. In the outback area you start in as Trevor I found ditching cops was as easy as veering off the road and going straight for a bit.

I think it works so much better than in previous games. You used to be able to just burn them off by driving away fast but now you have to be clever and find places to hide. The first time I drove into the storm drain and then found a little passageway onto the underground train tracks I thought I was the cleverest bastard around.

It takes a little too long to lose the cops at lower star ratings. I would have figured that it would take longer to lose a 4-star rating than it would a 1-star, but I was wrong. Sitting in a parking garage for 2 minutes because I accidentally ran over someone is not fun. I'd rather die and restart at a hospital than waste time losing my criminal rating when not on a mission.

It's much better than GTA4, that's for damn sure. The vision cone system makes for some badass getaways that aren't highspeed chases, but rather stealthy and low profile driving. Granted, I've only had to escape 3-star wanted levels thus far. I do think the wait for the stars to disappear should be shorted on 1-2 star levels.

Overall though, I think it straddles the fine line between being easy and frustrating. Sleeping Dogs' cops were way too easy to evade. All you had to do was car check 1-2 cop cars and drive fast. You could never have a cool, prolonged car chase even if you wanted to because the cops simply weren't persistent enough. GTA4's was frustrating because the damn search zone would follow you as long as a cop saw you and once you're at 4-5 stars, the zone is pretty much spills over your minimap and you'd have so many cops and helicopters on you that it's impossible to escape that zone without ducking into the subway system on a car or heading into a pay and spray.

It's usually not too bad but when I have to steal a car to go somewhere and I just cannot shake the cops for whatever reason, it's really annoying.

I haven't had much problem with the notoriety system so far. It seems fine, but I will say that it takes too long for the cops to go away when you're hiding, and hiding itself seems somewhat inconsistent. I hid behind a small rock on a beach yesterday, but a few hours before that I hid in a fenced-in, covered front yard near Michael's house and a cop car found me.

I think it's really tedious escaping from them. It should take less time.

I actually like how you deal with cops in this game. I found that by hiding your car in a back alley or a parking lot off the road you can ditch the cops a whole easier. In past games I did the whole outrace the police cars until your out of their circle or they crashed.

Really like the line of sight system. Makes for much more interesting getaways. I actually have to keep an eye on the map and take side streets, as opposed to GTAIV, where the best strategy is always to go really fucking fast.

How you earn stars, though, is about as inconsistent as its always been, which is disappointing.

I haven't had one problem with the line of sight seeing through walls or buildings. Seems easy to me, haven't had the chance to try and escape helis though; however, I feel that escaping helis should be hard, it's pretty hard to shake one considering they're up in the air! haha There should be areas in the game that have high chances for high speed wind gusts where it would be dangerous for the helis to fly. This would make escape dynamic.

I found the notoriety system way more interesting than in any other GTA game. And about the fact that you get stars ''at random'': you don't. You get heat if there is a cop that sees or hears the crime or if it's a very loud crime like something exploded or something.

This.

But also this... Being able to hide and such is a great addition, but it also takes far too long for the notoriety to dissipate while you're hiding and sleuthing around. Especially for 1-star offences, which should only take a few seconds and not up to the 3 or so minutes it can sometimes last.

Yeah, parking in an alley and waiting for the stars to go away takes way too long.

in the city, parking in an alley and waiting or changing cars seems to work. if its a good enough car to hold on to, i'll try to outrun them. In the country, it usually means i'm gonna die as soon as a chopper gets involved.

I hate it. You could outrun the cops in GTA IV which felt great. Having to find a hidden area and just sit there to lose the heat isn't fun.

I think it's great personally. It's pretty easy too.

• Outrun cops
• Hide somewhere off-road away from places cars can get to and preferably sheltered from the air
• Wait
• Win

Also, the fact you sometimes get cops on you or not come down to two factors. First is the fact there might be police in close proximity that see you doing the crime and the other is the people who get the crime down to them and/or the people around might call the cops.