Recording gameplay from my console

Is there some kind of gadget that allows you to record your gameplay on a console? I have a friend asking me a bunch of questions on Final Fantasy 12 and it would be much easier for me to simply send a decent quality video of me playing the game to him (or burn it to DVD).

The best tactic for me would be if I could just record what's on the TV and not put the console itself into the equation.

Feel free to offer pricier suggestions.

This is assuming you are using the composite video to play on your PS2. I'm also assuming that there aren't any other differences in equipment in different parts of the world (me being in the US and you apparently in Australia). Also note that I myself don't own a PS2 nor have I ever really used it much, but it should be the same for any console really. I'll also assume you don't have not-so-old equipment. So everything I mention here I'll assume your equipment has as these are fairly standard nowadays.

You'll need 2 things first, a "male-to-male" RCA-cable and a video recording device. Here, I'll use a VCR as an example.

To be able to play your PS2 on your TV, you will probably have one of many different setups for it to work. A common one is to just connect your PS2 directly to your TV using RCA video cables (the yellow/white/red set of cables).

The cables will usually go to (one of) the "video in" connections in the back of the TV to your PS2 in the appropriate connector. It will probably look like this (other unrelated details left out):

And this is how you can play your games. The signal comes out of your PS2 and goes into your TV. You can see the results on your TV.

Now to the recording. Your TV will probably have a "video out" connection too. This would allow the signals your TV receives to send it out to another device. We want these signals to go out into our recording device so it can record it. We could use a VCR to do this. Record it on tape and you're good to go. To connect it, connect the RCA cable from the TV's "video out" to your VCR's "video in" (it might be called "line in" instead). So it should look like this in the end:

Once you have this all set, all you have to do is start playing, load a blank tape into the VCR and start recording. Then you can share the tape with your friend. Simple right?

I currently use a Hauppage HD PVR to record game play via component output from a PS3 set at 720p. The quality of the capture is very good, but I have had some reliability issues and the external box and cables are quite bulky.

I am about to purchase a Blackmagic Intensity Pro capture card as this seems to be the other popular choice and can be fitted inside a PC.

Bear in mind that you will need a reasonably high spec PC to process the input in any event. Here is an example of game footage I captured recently using the Hauppage HD PVR.

Don't waste your time and money on cheaper solutions if you want a decent result.

I think a capture card is what you need. I haven't used one myself (I play games on PC), so I can't really recommend you a particular product, although Hauppauge seems to be a popular brand for these kinds of things.

I use a SlingBox to record game play playing at HD. The basic process is run the console through the slingbox to the TV (Very similar to Jeff Mercado's answer). Then run Fraps on the PC to record the slingbox stream.

I believe some of the nicer versions of SlingBox also support HDMI, component and composite cables.