Question about (legal) emulation
 

Ladies and gentlemen, I gots me a problem here.

Situation: I want to play FFIX and X.
Problem: I have no PlayStation or PS2, and I don't want to buy one for two games.
Solution I thought might work: Emulating a PS2 on my computer.

I haven't delved deep into the matter, but I recall having heard that PS2 emulation works roughly like this: You run the emulator from your hard drive and the game from a CD in your CD crive; usually a copied CD, sure, but I'd wager it works with originals, and I'm more than willing to buy the games if this plan of mine has a chance of working. What I'd like to know is: Does it or am I horribly wrong about the mechanics involved?

By the way, I have a 1,6 GHz Athlon XP CPU, 256 MB RAM and (which is probably the biggest problem) a NVIDIA Riva TNT2 graphics card (32 MB).

To summarize:
- Can one play original PS2 games on one's PC with an emulator?
- Can my PC even run a decent emulator?
- If yes, can someone suggest a decent PS2 emulator?

(Or at least PlayStation, so's I can play FFIX.)

Thanks in advance.

1 - It is possible, but my friend's copy didn't work at all, though there *are* emulators out there for the PS2.
2 - I'm not too sure of the specs but your comp seems good for everything except the graphics card.
3 - PS2 emulators aren't very common. PS1 emulators are, though. Try caesar.com (or something like that - I forgot the exact URL and I'm not at home now)

Also, I'd doubt most PS2 games would work on a CD, as many of them are... modified DVDs? If there was a PS2 emulator, you'd need a DVD drive to play the games off of.

i had a PSX emulator once on my iBook (this was like, four years ago), and althought it was nice and allowed me to play FM3 on my computer, it never really worked properly. it had a tendancy to crash when anyone sufffered leg damage, and when i tried to play Chrono Cross on it the item selection menu didnt work.

is there anyone you can borrow a PS2 from? or at least play it while at thier house.

Gotta look into that, Johnny, but I do think I have a better solution...

I poked around on zophar.net, and while there are three PS2 emulators, none of them is above v0.5, which I don't trust. Not good.

My thoughts at this moment: So... since I'd need a DVD drive for the PS2 games anyway, and since I've been thinking about acquiring either that or a DVD player, I guess I could just go and buy a drive... followed by a new graphics card in order to watch DVD's on the TV, which is more comfortable.

Of course, if I have to buy stuff anyway, I could just as well go out, buy a used PS2 and get it over with.

Wait. A PS2 can play DVD's.

I think I'm on to something here.

Yeah, if you're gonna have to upgrade that much, don't bother. A PS2 should be cheaper.

Especially now. Since GC dropped their price to $100, PS2 will probably be the first to follow suit and drop to either $150 or $100, since they have a new console on the way in a year or two.

And to think, I figured that PS2's DVD player wouldn't be a selling point for it anymore now that DVD players are as (or perhaps even more common) than VCRs. Guess I was wrong.

Keep in mind, this isn't the average situation.

Don't even bother with the emulators and stuff. If by pure chance you got a good emulator finding a working rom would be hell. and if you want to get a dvd player a used ps2 would be cheaper than dive+grapics card.

On a emulation sidenote the game is just proof of purchase as long as you can prove that you purchase the game its legal.

On a PS2 sidenote mmake sure the disk reader works. Many of them are defective and work poorly.
Spiffy Has Spoken.