I think second best. First goes to Suikoden II, also best game ever made. Sadly, nobody played it, so it-s hard to find someone who agrees.

JRPGs for PS2:

Dragon Quest VIII
Star Ocean: Till The End of Time
Xenosaga Trilogy
Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne
SMT: Digital Devil Saga 1 & 2
SMT: Persona 3 (Get Persona 3: FES while you still can)
Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria
Odin Sphere
Disgaea 1 & 2
Kingdom Hearts 1 & 2
The Shadow Hearts series
The .hack series.

I'm pretty sure there are more. but right now I'm playing more RPGs on the PSP and the DS.

First, keep in mind that I'm not a fan of the "standard" JRPG. By "standard" I mean cutscene-laden, super-easy, childish-story-that-takes-itself-too-seriously JRPGs. That said, my favorites on the PS2 were/are:

Shin Megami Tensei Nocturne: A deep, immersive, and challenging dungeon crawler. Everything about this game, from the Pokemon-like creature maintenance, to the turn-based battles that require actual strategy, to the unique setting and characters that are about as far from cliche as you can get, is just superb. It's expensive on the secondary market, but I cannot recommend it enough.

Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 FES: I'm about 15 hours into it right now. It's basically "Nocturne-lite plus high school," and it somehow works. The battles aren't as satisfying because you only control your main character (don't let that discourage you, though, as your party members have excellent AI, and you can control their AI setting on the fly), and the setting, story, and characterization aren't quite as dark as Nocturne, but the creation/fusion system, social links, respectable difficulty, and "just-one-more-turn" progression will likely keep you playing for all of the main game's 70 hour length. Oh, and there's also a second campaign that's supposedly another 30 hours or so. That, and it's only $30. New.

Shin Megami Tensei: Digital Devil Saga 1 & 2: By now you should be seeing a pattern. I love Atlus for developing what are basically JRPGs for adults - both in story/setting and challenge level. The DDS games aren't as good as the first two because they lack the innovative fusion system, but they'll give you your dungeon crawler fix just fine.

Shadow Hearts 1 & 2: I'm grouping these together because they basically tell one continuous story. These games lean toward the easy side of things, but what sets them apart is the inventive "judgment ring" battle system, which makes for a hybrid turn-based/twitch-based gameplay experience. The setting is also a nice change from your usual "generic fantasy land;" both games take place in an alternate early-20th-century Earth where magic and demons exist. Oh, also, you should know that these two games are actually funny. No, scratch that: not just funny, but hilarious. Most games that attempt humor tend to fail miserably, but these are two of the few that succeed. [Give From the New World a miss, though; it's awful in comparison to the first two.]

Dragon Quest 8: The penultimate "oldschool-style" RPG. You walk around, you grab treasure, you kill things in long dungeon treks, you level up, and sometimes you make stuff in your alchemy pot. And that's about it. And, really, that's all you need when a game like that is as polished as this one. The story is mostly fluff, and that's all right by me.

I've tried a bunch of others - the Xenosagas, Star Ocean 3, all of the Final Fantasies, Kingdom Hearts, and so on - and they've ranged the gamut from, "okay but not worth the time commitment" to, "ugh, why did I buy this?" So, if you have any questions about any of those other games, please say so. The seven that I've listed above are the only ones I consider essential buys, though.

@cklmb

definetely not

Chrono Trigger & FF6 disagree

ps1 is the greatest. end of story.

CC and FF6 (though not as good as the originals) was already on PSX. Add FF7, Xenogears, Vagrant story and Chrono Cross and you can forgetaboutit....

But then again ckmlb has a point since PSX games can be played on the PS2. So technically the 60gb PS3 is the best RPG console!

PS3! heh.

Eh, i don't know. Personally i'm not sure i'm willing to count BC. Aside from which the CT port sucked.  If you counted ports i'd say PS1 and SNES were close

bud I'd still say SNES which had a lot of solid RPGs as well, along with Earthbound an RPG I really think deserves to be up there in the conversations of great RPGs of all time.

Of course I also thought FF7, Chrono Cross and Vagrant Story all sucked and gave all three games away.

Wild Arms 3/4/5 have their moments of excellence, and can generally be found for 10-20 bucks.

And thought SNES contains some of the best, the PS2 was in no way shape or form a weak RPG console.

I also rather enjoy Digital Devil Saga1/2, but those games will eat you. Bad joke.

And Persona 3 will blow your head