For one time only, we're giving you a very special Monday Morning Rundown, written by yours truly, because Rob Wright is off sunning himself. To get us going, I have to report that I'm a very, very sad man. My precious Battlefield 2, and Battlefield 2: Special Forces, discs have been broken.

Ohh how I miss you...

"How the hell," says you, "could you break two discs in one go?" Well it wasn't in one go, it was over a period of a couple of months. And I didn't break it - the DVD box did. Yes, yes, it does sound a little like "the dog ate my homework," but it's true. The shoddy flippin' DVD cases ate my discs.

We're all familiar with DVD cases, I presume. They're more rugged than the plastic CD jewel cases of old, which would come apart if you accidentally dropped them on anything. Also, the self-contained nature of the DVD packaging has probably saved a few trees from being felled, and attics from filling up, by replacing the big old cardboard boxes of yesteryear.

The problem with these cases is the different ways in which they lock down the disc. Do it right and the disc comes out without a scratch. Do it wrong, however, and you have to apply inordinate amounts of force which, at the end of the day, introduce cracks into the rather thin disc. If you see Figure 1 you have the push-button design present in many EA cases.

Figure 1: Push here for doom and such

This design is absolutely viscous where the destruction of games is concerned. There is a right and a wrong way to remove a disc from this sort of case, and both will leave you with an unusable disc at the end of the day. The wrong way to remove a disc from this case is to grab it at the side and lift upwards. That's the fast route towards a cracked disc, and it's your own fault if you do so.

The slow and painful way towards getting yourself a cracked disc is by pushing down on the middle retainer, as you're instructed to do. When you do so you will hear an audible crack, which is always a good sign. Do this often enough and your disc will begin to fall apart.

On my Battlefield 2 and Battlefield 2: Special Forces discs, both of which come in this kind of a DVD case, there is a crack which began in the middle of the disc. This extended outwards as I used the disc in the drive (the spinning forces put pressure on the fault) as well as from continuing to use the DVD case. I've also seen this happen to the discs of other games using the same sort of case, making them unusable. I won't use the Battlefield 2 disc for fear of it coming apart in the drive, and the Special Forces one has packed it in altogether, now refusing to be read.