Was this copy protection or a virus?

[AndyFC]

Reading a thread about copy protection reminded me of something from when I was younger, and have occasionally wondered about.
In the early nineties, must have been 94 as I had a 1200, I borrowed a boxed flight sim from a friend but never got to play. It was on two disks and both would start to load but just display DID in red on a black background all over the screen. This was static. I have a feeling that DID was an abbreviation of the publisher but looking at HOL none of the boxes for Digital Integration spark memories.

He said he'd lent it to someone else before and they must have tried to copy it.

 So was this some sort of copy protection which ruined a game or was it something else like a virus? Seems a bit mean for copy protection purposes.

[AmiDude]

Hmm.. strange story... And what does "DID" and "HOL" means?

[paul1981]

Sounds like a virus, as most of the flight sims I've come across are system friendly disks which are hard drive installable.

[AndyFC]

Sorry, HOL is the Hall Of Light website. DID was the word displayed on screen, which might be Digital Illusions something...

[AndyFC]

And from more searching on the name of DID I think the game was F29 retaliator.

[golem]

I remember F29: Retaliator displays DID in red on black as a splash screen. I think if it is working properly you have to click the mouse or press fire for it to move to the next screen.