Yes, and no. It depends on which PS3 you get. The first PS3s to be released, the CECHB01 (20GB hard drive) and the CECHA01 (60GB hard drive), can both play PS2 games. Those were released in 2006. Since then, only one model of PS3 has backwards-compatibility support, which is the 80GB CECHE01 (released in 2007). As of today, 20 March 2009, all the other PS3s do not have support for older games.
Note, too, that Sony made a decision similar to Microsoft with the XBox 360 for this generation's console: rather than making the console's operating system recognize and play all previous generation's games (as was done with the PS2), PS3 backwards-compatibility relies on the manufacturers of the older games to write emulators for each individual title in their catalog, which can then be downloaded and executed to run the older games. What this means is that not even close to all PS2 games will run on a PS3, just as not all Xbox games will run on a 360. Before you sell or trade-in your PS2, you should check Sony's web site to see which of your PS2 titles can actually be played on a backwards compatible PS3. That site is here:
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