The second game console to ever come out of Sony Corp. was of course the Sony PlayStation 2. This unit was announced in 1999 and released in 2000. This was a perfect release date for the Sony PlayStation 2, as it was a year after the Sega Dreamcast was released, and a year before the Xbox and the GameCube. This was a sixth generation game console and was one of the fastest selling and most dominant game consoles in the history of the gaming industry. There have been over 120 million units shipped around the world.
When the PS2 was originally released, there were some serious manufacturing delays. There was even a rumour that the PlayStation 2 was being made by a single person in his garage. What a lot of people did was to go out and buy a PlayStation 2, and then sell it on eBay for almost 3 to 4 times the price.
The best thing about the PlayStation 2, was that it was completely backwards compatible. This meant that not only could you play the new PS2 games on this console, you could play the original PS one games on the console as well. There was some speculation that the competition between Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo would be close, but unfortunately after the 2001 holiday season, there was no match. The number of blockbuster games that were released added so much momentum to the sales of PlayStation 2s that there was no competition at all.
Although originally the Sony PS2 was not online capable, Sony later added the capabilities to their system in order to compete against the Xbox. They also went as far as creating several first person shooter releases to make use of online warfare.
By 2004 the next generation of Grand Theft Auto was ready to be released. In order to counter this, Sony decided to unveil the new Slimline, PlayStation 2. The Sony Corporation then completely stopped all production of the larger size PS2, and opted to only produce the Slim version. Unfortunately, when Sony had made this decision, they had not allowed for the appropriate offset between production lines, and this became an issue when 70,000 units being shipped to the UK from China got held up because of an oil tanker being stuck in the Suez Canal.
Not only was the PS2 backwards compatible with the original PlayStation, but this new PlayStation 2, could read DVDs and CDs. This unit also had playback features that were DVD quality. You're also able to purchase a network adapter to allow some of the PlayStation 2s to compete in online multiplayer games. To counter piracy and online cheating, Sony also developed their Dynamic Network Authentication System, or DNAS as it was better known.
Although originally the PS2 came in just the standard black colour, since then, a number of colours are now available. These colours depend on the region, but are available in ceramic, yellow, silver, opaque blue as well as many other choices.
Original Authors: Gobel Team (Nick)
Edit Update Authors: M.A.Harris
Updated On: 25/05/2008
