Do it, don't tell anyone, and do it in a way that you cannot be "tracked" or otherwise noted to have done it.

You shouldn't have to do this but the issue is unclear and there shouldn't be anything wrong with it but big content producers believe there is (go ahead and read Nintendo's FAQ on emulators, it's enough to make a fan start hating Nintendo simply on principle).

I'm glad Nintendo make games exclusively for consoles they designed. Not every game has to be designed around the keyboard and mouse. Different hardware means different possibilities. Just look at the way the Nintendo DS almost singlehandedly revived the adventure genre from the grave, thanks to its touchscreen.

There aren't even flight sims being made on PC anymore thanks to the dominance of keyboard and mouse. Not many fighting games or platformers either. Even non-action RPGs have become rare (though I'm not sure why). The idea that all these console games should have been made on PC instead is just laughable.

Many companies have done this with their own games. SNK, for example, sells PS2 compilations with many of their games running on an emulator. All their virtual console releases of the old games are an emulator too. Sega sells their old Genesis games on PC. Irem has an arcade pack at DotEmu which bundles many of their arcade games in an emulator.

No, because you do not own the software required to perform the emulation, and you cannot lawfully obtain it (unless you own the console and can copy the software from it). That is the key point in most emulation cases.

Some cases argue that clean room implementations of the emulators are legal (there's BIOS copying cases that never went to trial specifically because of the spec team being different than the implementation team). So it's not cut and dried.
What on earth does that have to do with anything at all that's been said?

I deeply suspect I'll regret this later...:(

That's true. However, very few present situations involve "clean room" or licensed emulator code. In particular, nobody has a "clean room" BIOS for PS2, which is what you would need to avoid having to do a transfer from your own PS2.

Two firms did succeed in creating "clean room" emulators for the original PlayStation: Connectix and Bleem. Sony sued Connectix and lost, but bought the rights to the emulator and retired it. Bleem also defeated Sony in court, but went bankrupt before they could enjoy any fruits of their victory.

Hmmh. I always thought it was legal to download a rom, if you owned the original cartridge. At least that's what the emulation sites always told me, back when I used to download roms more.

Somewhat off-topic, but I'm not sure that's the only reason. Some flying games are still relatively fresh, although the amount of releases in this category seem to be way less than during the 1990s. I'm not sure there's much of a market for more "hardcore" simulators. A few solid and somewhat brushed-up oldies such as Falcon 4.0 and Jane's F/A-18 are still being kept very much "alive" among some communities, I think. As always I could be wrong.

Nope, that was never legal. The License was "bound" to your cartridge. Even making copies can be illegal, depending on your local laws. Those are the same assumptions that lead to the thought that "abandonware" is legal.

And with the current round of anti-piracy laws, it's even worse. Eg.If I download a GOG that I bought here from some "not legal looking site" (because the GOG downloader is not working properly, I know ridicoulus assumption) I'm commiting a crime over here.

However, as I said many times before, only care for laws if prosecution is an issue. As long as nobody comes looking, who cares if it is illegal or not. Your own morality should be your only judge.

Remember when all the emulation sites used to say it was okay to download ROMs for 24 hours or less for ... testing purposes? ;)

No, period. Except if you dump your own PS2 BIOS and your game's CD on the PC, it *should* be legal that way.

Haha, now that you mentioned it, I do remember some of them saying so.

Depends. In some countries creating copies is forbidden if you have to bypass copy protection. In other countries creating copies for personal use is legit, even if you have to breach copy protection.