I am looking at PS2 games right now and I thought I'd make a topic so people can see what people would recommend.

I recommend Star Wars: Battlefront 2, because it has almost infinite replayability. It's a cool game. Rouge Trooper is a cool game because you can do all kinds of awesome maneuvers, like pulling yourself up against a wall, or using X to flip over obstacles etc. Your guns are cool, too, and you need to watch your ammo loads. Also, Jakk 2 & 3 are awesome. The story is really great, it's a really fun game. The only thing is is that it isn't really replayable. All of these games are T rated.

I've been looking at Robotech: Battlefront, and Tribes Aerial Assault. Anybody here played that before?

For my money, the best two games for the PS2 were Ico and Rez. However, both games are hard to find now and they are both short.

Ico takes about 6 hours, and there is very little replay value for most people. The path through the game is extremely linear, and there is only one optional area in the entire game. It's hard to top for atmosphere, though.

If you can play all the way through without dying, Rez only takes an hour. But the gameplay itself is very enjoyable, and replay modes and unlocks help make repeat play fun.

My favorite games include Ico, Shadow of the Colossus, all of the Armored Core games, the Xenosaga RPG series (the first one is still my favorite, but they're all awesome), and Gran Turismo 4.

I was also impressed with the two Kingdom Hearts games and Final Fantasy X & X-2.

If you're into RPG's, I would also suggest Tales of Symphonia and, to a lesser extent, Tales of the Abyss.

I also highly recommend any of the Guitar Hero games.

The original Red Faction FPS was fun, although I was disappointed by the sequel...the same with the Devil May Cry series (although I haven't tried the third game yet).

That actually wraps up most of the games I've ever really had a chance to play on the PS2...I'm not big on renting games, and have always had a limited budget to buy them, so...

Okami
Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando
Disgaea
Katamari Damacy
God of War
Sly 2: Band of Thieves
Psychonauts

I tried Armored Core 3 and was dissappointed by it. The scale felt off, the missions were much too short, the enviroments weren't that special. I liked fighting in the city, but you didn't get to do enough of it. Is Armored Core Nexus any better? I found a cool game called Front Mission 3 for PS1. It's a strategy game with big pwning mechs. Looks cool.

Ratchet & Clank: Going Commando is awesome. Much better than Up Your Arsenal, though that was stupidly fun as well.



What's Xenosaga? I think I remember reading that name on an Amazon search, but I can't remember much about it.


I'm probably going to get Half-Life for PS2, just because I've heard it is a great game.

I'd reccomend all of these. I'd also throwin any Guitar Hero game and Shadow of the Colossus, Kingdom Hearts, and some others I can't remember right now. I haven't played any of these besides Okami and Guitar Hero, but I've heard a lot of good things about them.

As far as the Armored Core games go, my favorite one so far has been Armored Core 2: Another Age, although Armored Core: Silent Line (the expansion/sequel to AC3) I also greatly enjoyed. I haven't played any of the later games, but if I remember right Nexus wasn't the same kind of game as the other AC's. I think the next AC in the main series was AC: Last Raven.


Xenosaga is a space-opera RPG. Battles are turn based, you can see the enemies on the screen instead of true random encounters. The storyline is quite complicated, and the series was initially planned to have six games...instead they packed a crapload of story into the third game. The first game is my favorite, it had a good balance of story and action, for me at least. The second game focused almost primarily on one particular character and while I found it fun, the narrowed scope I didn't really appreciate. With all of the story packed into the third game you'd spend some time fighting followed by a lot of story which kind of messed up the pacing. Still, I had a lot of fun playing it...and when you finally got to the end it was definitely worth it. My only suggestion would be to try out the first game, if you can find it, and then pick up the others if you want to see what everything means and where it all ends.

Xenosaga is sorta neat, though there's a lot of FMV. As in, people have compiled all the FMVs into a single video, and it still makes sense. I recommend playing the PSX game Xenogears by Square first for a little boost of understanding, even though the games are related only in name.

All my picks have been hit upon already except for Final Fantasy XII. It's actually one of my least favourite in the FF series because the music is lame and the story is cliché, but it's pretty and will keep you busy forever and a half.

If you have any experience with Grand Theft Auto, then San Andreas will be the ride of your life. If you're like me and played it first, though, I guarantee you will drown. That game was too freakin' hard. I'm playing GTA III now and feel so much more comfortable.

I played San Andreas for the first time and it didn't seem that hard to me. I guess it's each to their own.

Hmm, I'll look up Silent Line. Maybe I could get it on the cheap.



That sounds really cool. I'll look it up. I love games with complicated stories. I HATE random encounters. They are VILE. The worst thing the PS2 RPG genre inherited from FF1. Glad there's games without them. Are there guns in this game? Or is it another 'sci-fi with swords' setting?



FMV sounds good. I wouldn't turn my nose up at that.

I thought of another game that's pretty much a time waster. Wildarms 3 isn't a great game, but it is pretty good. It will keep you occupied for a long, LONG time, it's got an okay combat system, it has a moderately interesting stories. Although I would reccomend you get my above 4 games whenever you have the chance (Jakk2 & 3 had awesome stories, SW: Battlefront 2 and Rouge Trooper are really fun to play with other people, though Rouge Trooper has only 3 good maps), I'd only reccomend that you get Wildarms 3 if you can get it for cheap.

Heh, yes, there are guns in Xenosaga. Very big ones, and some incredible FMV's (many with more big guns)

Good. Very big guns is good. Time to check wikipedia for its article on Xenosaga. Say, what's the ESRB rating say for Xenosaga? It doesn't say on amazon, otherwise I'd check there.

{edit} Oh, that rating is A-OK. I checked on the ESRB website. Nevermind. I'll definately get that game, it sounds cool.

Xenosaga does indeed win your internets. Other games that are good, if you like RPGs, are the .hack series, a MMO-style game where you play a person playing an MMO where things are going Horribly Wrong (it's more fun than it sounds); Star Ocean to the End of Time, a Final Fantasy-style RPG set in space; and Final Fantasy XII, zomg it's so pretty. Also the first real Final Fantasy game to have all the races seen in FFXI.

=Divals

Didn't say FMV = bad. Just saying if you tend to twitch violently in your seat when you're not actively doing something, Xenosaga would be a problem. If you liked Chrono Trigger, you'll also be glad to know the composer for that game and Xenogears did the music for Xenosaga as well. But, above all, the key point of Xenosaga is that it has bewbies. I hear that the protaganist's costume gets skimpier each game.

Well, that and the "swimsuit" armor.

Stuff i have on my PS2:
Ace Combat: Fighter simulator. It's...ok. Fun but gets kinda old. Also depends on what version you have. Some are vastly better than others
Armored Core: Mechs that kill each other. If you get one, get Last Raven. Most parts. Problem is balance. Some parts are vastly better than others which kinda make them not worth using. Oh...and the game is massively hard. Boot up an FAQ. Don't even try without it. Of the first two missions one is moderately hard, the other i've yet to beat.
Guilty Gear Accent Core: One of the best 2d fighters in existence. Learning curve like a wall if you want to really get into it through. Depends.
DBZBT3: I like the engine. Simple yet fun blasting each other to hell.
Thats about it. My roommate has FFXII(Which i really don't like) and the metal gear solid series(which is quite fun if you haven't gotten around to it).

Ok..read more of the topic...some more indepth on armored core.

Armored core has changed a lot but its key to understand how they generally do the games.

First you'll have a main game...like armored core 2 or 3. These are usually ok in all areas.
Then you'll have an expansion like Silent line. THE EXTREMELY IMPORTANT THING TO UNDERSTAND: they assume that you've beaten Armored core 3 and therefore have parts from it. Picking up silent line and trying to beat it stock is VERY hard. Again. If you go for it FAQ it. I own silent line, nexus, and last raven. I managed to beat nexus, never beat silent line, and made it through most of raven since i had all my parts from nexus. Just know that if you expect to jump into silent line you will die. A lot.

Edit 2: on robotech battlefront:
I just discovered you didn't mean invasion. My friend is a huge fan of robotech and has the game for the cube. it's quite fun but again..another difficult one. I enjoyed it personally but theres not a whole lot to do if you don't have friends to duke it out with in multi.

Actually, I don't think I will get Xenosaga. 30 minute long cutscenes? Errg. I don't think I have quite enough patience for that.



Yeah, Invasion didn't get too good reviews, as I recall. I like robotech, so I'm planning on getting Battlecry.

Right now, my picks are X-men: Legends, Robotech: Battlecry, Half-life, and Front Mission 3.

I'm gonna go ahead and give some more detailed descriptions on these games, as you appear to have totally ignored them, which is a damned shame.

Okami: probably the prettiest game I've ever seen on the PS2; the entire game looks like Japanese brush painting. You play as the goddess of the sun incarnated into a wolf, running around and playing out various Japanese myths. Plays a lot like a Zelda game, but with an aesthetic sense that Zelda only wishes it could achieve.
Disgaea: Tactical RPG on crack. Not only is the storyline hilarious, but your party members are customizable to an absurd degree. You can level up your equipment by diving into it, where you battle through its "Item World", a sequence of randomly-generated dungeons. Also features the ability to pick up and throw units, explosive demon penguins, and in general a very finely-tuned combat system (which is even more refined in Disgaea 2).
Katamari Damacy: if you haven't played this game, then there's something wrong with you. It's cheap, it's fun, and it's one of the defining games of the PS2. Get. It.
God of War: Probably the most brutal game on the PS2, definitely not for the immature. Play as Kratos, a sort of Herakles, and slaughter your way through various Greek mythic beasts with the eventual goal of taking out Ares himself. Gameplay is third-person beat-em-up, nicely refined.
Sly 2: Band of Thieves: Takes the stealth genre and makes it actually fun. You get a band of thieves (a raccoon, a turtle, and a hippo, covering the stealth, brains, and brawn, respectively) who have to make off with stolen goods from various well-defended criminals (stealing from normal people would be too easy, clearly). Each level is a massive free-roaming area with various tasks to perform by individual gang members, leading up to the big caper itself which everyone participates in.
Psychonauts: You know the guy that wrote Invader Zim? He wrote this too. Psychonauts is a third-person adventure game where you play as a psychic; thus, most of the levels take place inside other peoples' minds. Top-notch writing and the gameplay's pretty solid too.

Yes, I did ignore them because there was no description. But now that there's description...

Okami: This sounds pretty cool. I like the idea a lot. I'll look this up.

Disgaea: Sounds kinda kooky (not in a bad way, though). Maybe I'll take a look.

Katamari Damacy: I've looked at the Katamari games and I frankly can't tell why this would be fun. It looks kind of childish. But I could (easily) be mistaken, not having played it before.

God of War: I know a guy who has this and he says it is cool, but the nudity makes it a negative for me ATM.

Sly 2: Band of Thieves: I'm not really sure I could get into this. I'll look it up though.

Psychonauts: It's an interesting concept, but I've looked at it before and again I'm not sure I could get into something like this.

Does anyone ever remember a game called Chrono Cross? I forget if it was for the PS1 or the PS2 but it was such an awesome game. Was a remake of Chrono Trigger I think. I would kill to be able to play those games again.

Actually it was a PS1 sequel to chrono trigger that wasn't very well recieved. Personally i thought the original chrono trigger was astoundingly better with much more interesting plot and characters, but thats just me.

I liked Chrono Trigger much better than Chrono Cross as well. There wasn't a very main plot in Chrono Cross, and the only thing that made it different from other games at that time was that you literally had dozens of characters who could join your party along the way. This meant that it had a lot of replay value, but I didn't feel like replaying it and going through everything again just to get different characters who I still wouldn't care about since they had no overall purpose in the plot.

I would caution against HL for PS2. It's not a very good port. Just get it on the PC, it's from 1998, there's nothing that can't run it.

I understood that Steam was a pain in the $#@ to use, though, and made running HL a pain. Or something like that. I'm not exactly sure what Steam is. I hoped to avoid any trouble by getting the console version.

Steam is a software delivery system, deploying games from online instead of from a stack of CDs. Steam is a good idea in theory (you can buy games online and have them installed immediately), but Valve dropped the ball in developing it. Reselling a game is next to impossible because the CD key is bound to a Steam account the second you supply it. If you want to sell a game off, you have to give the user/pass to your Steam account too.

What I'd recommend is finding an old PC copy of HL1 from 1998 to 200X, before Steam was released. As long as a valid CD key accompanies the game, you won't have to mess with Steam.

Meh, I like Steam fine. I mean, are you really going to resell a 9 year old game you got for 10 bucks? Good point about switching game registrations though. It can't be done. Anyway, there's plent of good features of Steam, like how it automatically updates all your games for you, includes built-in friends lists, server browesers, etc, and you can open your account on any PC and dowload all your games directly without having to find the CDs or re-enter the keys.

Edit: almost forgot. Another reason to get HL on the PC is that there are a lot of great mods that people still play, and you can only use them on the PC.

Dark Cloud
Jak-Ratchet and Clank series (I've beaten R&C 1-4, but only played jak 1 )
Gran Turismo 4
Star Wars Battlefront II's alright.
I have always been a fan of Final Fantasy-s (IX-XII I have played)
Hmm...

You're getting ripped off if you pay $10.

Well, too late now. I got it for ten bucks at Gamestop. Guess I got ripped off...

I've only played Decay (the two player mode) so far, but I like it already. Running out of the room with the anti-mass thingy, swatting at the bug things frantically as you run towards the security room, breaking the glass and yelping as a bug jumps at your head, diving in and grabbing the and pumping lead at the bug until it dies.... Priceless.

I also got X-men: Legends and its sequal at the store. I wanted to replace Champions of Norrath (a mediocre game but fun with two people playing) with XM:L, and I think I have. There's not a lot of story that I've seen so far in XM:L, but even that is much more than the amount of story in Champions of Norrath. Plus fighting in XM:L is loads of fun. You can have four team members at a time. You can grab an enemy and throw them at another team member. You can grab an explosive barrel and throw it at someone. You can also smash through interior walls in indoor complexes. The AI for your computer controlled X-men is really good, too. And if another person wants to play, it's as simple as turning on the other controller. Also, the X-men were well done. It's a really good game.




Jak 2 and 3 are rad. Get them ASAP. You won't regret it.

I didn't think Chrono Cross was all that bad to me. But it was a long time ago and my memory is very vague so I'm not sure.

The "brand new" quality item on the eBay list was $9.95. Who's going to try to save no more than eight bucks by getting a used nine-year old game, which may not even come with a CD Key?

Ask questions before you buy, or if there's any doubt, buy from another if possible. A halfway reputable seller makes it clear what's present and missing. With S&H added, the difference between $10 and that makes it admittedly less worthwhile, so 'ripped off' is a little aggressive of a phrase. For games made in the past five years, though, I almost always end up buying from half.com.

I'd just like to say that I've been having a load of fun with Tekken 4.

THeres also tekken 5 and tekken 5DR i believe.

Tekken? Isn't that a fighting game? Like, knock down drag out kung fu battle in the streets style?

Yep. I personally prefer DOA 2 Hardcore to Tekken 4 and 5. DOA is a bit slower paced, but more strategic in the way blocks and counters are handled, and DOA is also amazing for how good it looks for a game from 2000. IGN rates Tekken higher, but it's not my preference.

Just been playing HL. It's cool. I like it a lot.