Black magic console...or silver.

Author's Rating:

Pros: Easy to set up, ability to play ps1 titles, bargain priced games.

Cons: Noisy, chunky, limited space to 252MB combined, old pixeled graphics.

The Bottom Line: 
The ps2 is easier to set up and less cable mad than most rivals, being noisy does somewhat peg it back, I truly believe if overcome minor annoyances it's wonderful.

Author's Review
Ok, I believe to be able to review this platform we need to first identify wether you are upgrading from a ps1 or downgrading from a ps2.
i shall do both:
If you are upgrading from a ps1, then the ps2 will be a breath of fresh air, by far more titles out, better graphics, capablity to have long games in one cd rather than 3 or 4 seperate CDs for one game, When I upgraded it from the original playstation it was rather incredible, allowing me to play all my old ps1 games, while also playing new titles (at the time) for it, and it really is a fabulous piece of technology and having previously owned one of these, I know for a fact it is incredibly hard to break one of these, unless one starts dropping it from the 1st floor to the basement.

On the other hand if i were to downgrade from a ps3 to a ps2 which I have, then I would find that the ps2 is noisy, the entry slot for CDs scares me to death everytime it makes a robotic noise and I think it's going to break, gathers dust a lot more easily than bot hthe ps1 or the ps3, I have found that after a few hours of game time the ps2 starts to heat up this meaning the fans have to work extra hard, making even more noise, and your controller is plugged by a cable, one massive setback for me was that I went from 160GB to a sudden 32MB memory card, now I know for the games at that time it's enough but I can't help but feel I need more if I want to own a good collection of games, however with most ps3 users feeling cheated over the option of not being able to play old PS2 titles, for me the ps2 was a better option, I have now bought a bunch of old games by as little as £2 in comparisson to the ps3 titles which come out at a whooping £50, so for me despite the annoying setbacks and the constant heartache everytime I hear the robotic sound, it isn't too much of a 'downgrade' form the ps3 and it's a well worth kit.