Are games protected from making personal use copies?

[Gern Blanston]

I'm new to this, but I just got Battlefield 2 on CD, and I tried to make a backup copy on CD-R. I'm getting error messages, and I was wondering if games are protected from making copies. I'm able to copy other software (Quicken, Norton SystemWorks, MS Office) with no problem.

On an aside: is the DVD version of this game better than the CD, or is it just on fewer disks?

Thanks!

 

[DaveSimmons]

Yes. Nonstandard formatting and special bad sectors.

Also, some games include copy protection that refuses to run the game if game copying tools are installed on your PC.

 

[Leros]

I tried to make a backup copy of my UT2k4 dvd. It burnt fine (no errors), but the backup copy turned out to be quite worthless as I could not play or load the game with it.