i've been sent a copy of ssx tricky , when i try to ply it it lets me choose my player and then goes off, i've reburned it (reading at 2x & writing at 2x) but it's still the same
if it was because of an ea patch would the game even get this far or would it not load at all?

NO M8,

The first copy that I got did that and I was booting with Messiah so its not the ea patch. I think its just a bad burn as I got another copy off someone else and it worked perfect.

Yeah prabally is a bad burn. Or maybe the person that sent your the back up riped it incorectly.