For Gamers:

It is recommended to use PCSX2 v1.7.5 as future versions have compatibility issues with older packs. While on a thread, there will be a download link, some individuals hide it in their YouTube video description. Download the pack and make sure the Region matches your Game ID: SLUS=NTSC-U SLES=PAL SLPS=NTSC-J

"How to find Game ID" right-click the game in PCSX2 -> Properties -> Summary -> Serial: SLUS-XXXXX

(where the X's will be filled with numbers), Then unzip the folder into your PCSX2 Textures folder.

Folder structure should look like this: ...\pcsx2-v1.7.3989\textures\SLUS-20420\replacements\[many PNG/DDS files or various folders containing images]

Then either do emulator settings or per-game settings: Properties -> Graphics -> Texture Replacements -> Load Textures. Next, raise the Internal Resolution by at least 2x Native in Rendering tab and enable "Anti-Blur" in Display tab. You're done, but if you want to get more performance, It's recommended to have Asynchronous Texture Loading(Emulator Settings[on by default]) to load custom textures onto the CPU. If you have a weak CPU then you can enable Precache Textures(per-game or emulator settings) instead to use RAM, be sure to double-click on the empty box where Asynch Texture Loading is on per-game settings to disable it only for this game, but be wary of file sizes of packs, some packs can exceed 8GB so make sure you have enough RAM for them. Enjoy!

If you want to download covers automatically for games check this tutorial out: https://gbatemp.net/threads/download-all-covers-in-1-click.646693/

For Upscalers:

Texture Dumping: I start every dump by enabling texture dumping(do these per-game settings instead of emulator settings so it doesn't apply to every game)

"How to enable Texture Dumping" Right-click the game -> Properties -> Graphics -> Texture Replacements -> Dump Textures

Then play the game for about 5 minutes, save state, and close the emulator (don't count cutscenes towards playtime), check the newly created dumps folder in "PCSX2/textures/SLUS-XXXXX" where X will be filled in with numbers.

"How to find Game ID" right-click the game in PCSX2 -> Properties -> Summary -> Serial: SLUS-XXXXX

If this folder already has 200+ textures in it, that's a red flag, check the texture dumps to see what the most common names are and how small the textures are, if the textures are tiny (64x64 or smaller) then the high texture count is expected, pay attention to file size though, most dumps are between 20-400 megabytes and 500-3000 files. A bad dump will have a high file number and size, way above the estimates previously stated.

The good textures (most of the time) have 2 or 3 hyphens and look like this ex: 518bbd6c0ddb7991-3cc9f25b1d8fa414-r21000000210000-00005553.png

A bad texture (also known as a "bad dump") will have only one hyphen like this ex: 109f993e98e1f1aa-00002640.png

if "some" textures have one hyphen, that's a bad dump, more on that later.

If "all" textures have 2-3 hyphens, keep playing for an hour and check back to make sure there are no single hyphens. if there aren't any single hyphens then it's probably safe to assume it will be a safe dump, play to 100%

if "all" textures are one hyphen, it probably means that's the naming scheme specific to that game, I haven't encountered this more than once though so be cautious when this happens.

The most redundant textures that should exist in a proper dump should be between 2-25, if it exceeds this then it is probably a one-hyphen file that will dump infinitely (AKA a bad dump)

sometimes it can be a 2-3 hyphen in which case treat it like a bad dump, sometimes it's a gif that just exported every individual frame, most of the time they don't work so proceed with caution. If you keep "Dump Textures" on and finish the game with a bad dump you will get 100,000+ textures which will be unsalvagable. To avoid this, disable "Dump Textures" and bind the hotkey "Toggle Texture Dumping" to Space (and remove any other hotkey that was space by default[probably fast-forward]) and just dump whenever a new texture/cutscene plays.

Alternatively, There is a tool to help with 1000+ dumps per second games here. Use this tool as you play these games and don't forget to check the dumps often.

I recommend searching for cheats for each game since the PS2 was one of the last generation of console game libraries to feature them prominently. Cheats are a valuable asset in collecting every texture.

Once you've dumped the game, open the dumps folder and delete any bad dumps that might've appeared, usually, there is a pattern to bad dumps like one image appears repeatedly but has the same suffix "-00006800". You can type in the search bar ~*6800.png and it will highlight every image with that suffix and you can check if they're similarly bad dumps and delete them (sometimes you'll need to go deeper than the last hyphen like ~*d90-00006800.png for a specific pattern of bad textures as good textures will be grouped in with the bad ones as well for the last hyphen).

It's generally not recommended to dump FMVs since even a 2x Upscale of FMV-heavy games can exceed 50+ GBs, However, it can be worth it to upscale the intro/splash screens only.

Also, after finishing a dump, enable "mipmap dumping" and play a level for a minute and quit. Search in your dumps folder "mip" if nothing pops up, there's no need to enable mipmaps in DDS. If there are mipmaps than generate them with DDS when upscaling and it should overwrite them. You can convert PNG's to DDS at a later date if you don't export to DDS(this doesn't always work).

Don't forget to dump the bios save data icon for your game and separate it from every other icon and include in your dump. Some save data icons change states when selecting "Delete" and "Copy".

If you want to skip the upscaling part, I provide my upscaling service here: https://gbatemp.net/threads/pcsx2-hd-texture-upscale-service-free.642547/

Texture Upscaling: Once you've checked every texture is good, run the textures through your favorite AI upscaler, You could use Stable Diffusion if you have a powerful PC and don't mind the massive time sink, some good free models are bundled with Waifu-2x-Extension-GUI which I used before I discovered the best one for single model upscales IMO which is 4xHDCube4(There is a free version of this called 4xHDCube3 which is marginally worse and doesn't include Alpha channel upscaling)

"Download for 4xHDCube3" https://github.com/Venomalia/HDcube/tree/main/v3

Cupscale is a better option than Waifu-2xExtension with compatibility for more models made by individuals and is better suited for multi-model upscales.

4xHDCube4 costs $3 but saves significant amounts of time manually checking each texture to see which upscaler is best as it is as simple as insert textures -> convert -> Done. No need to check for errors which Generic ESRGAN models have a 5-10% error rate and when we're talking about thousands of textures, that's a painful amount of effort and isn't as good at converting and forgetting, just save yourself the hassle and get 4xHDCube.

If you do decide to go with 4xHDCube4, Here is a quick setup guide for ChaiNNer: https://gbatemp.net/threads/chainner-tutorial.655310/ I recommend these settings for ChaiNNer: 4xHDCube4.pth(Model A) 0% 4xHDCube4Plus-B.pth(Model B) 100% for high-detail textures such as real-life metal rust or walls (4xHDCube3 doesn't have A/B models). Change this to 30-70 or a higher mix of Model A if a game has mostly soft/2D drawing-style textures. Under Save image format, make sure it's DDS BC7 (Linear) with Best Quality compression as this is the highest quality compression which gives a massive performance boost at a barely noticeable reduction in fidelity. if you want compatibility with Mobile EMUs use DXT5 (legacy) instead until the emulator supports BC7 (AetherSX2 is no longer on the app store so this is unlikely to ever get support).

If you decide to use Waifu-2x-Extension-GUI only, then you'll need another program to convert the PNGs to DDS. Use Custom Texture Tool PS vXX.X configured with compressonator and BC7 image format for best results, no need to install upscalers in Custom Texture Tool's installer. Download: https://forums.dolphin-emu.org/Thread-custom-texture-tool-ps-v52-5

Alas, even 4xHDCube isn't immune to errors but it's significantly better than other ESRGANs rate at only <1% and (as of the time of this posting) only happens on very few games that have odd alpha channels, if you're a perfectionist like me then you'll want to clean up those bad textures so you'll want an image editor like Photoshop or GIMP to edit textures. I recommend separating the blurry textures into a separate folder to make it faster to batch load into the editor.

If you open a dumped image in an image editor it will show it at 50% opacity(not always), this is expected, set opacity to 100% to view the image without transparency by applying "Threshold Alpha" to the image and max it out (Only edit the image if there is no transparency information in the image that would appear in-game, otherwise the alpha transparency levels get messed up). If you ever export a texture from an image editor or use an image from the internet to replace a texture, make sure you open the image in an image editor and export it with the Opacity at 50% otherwise transparency will break. Here is a method of editing without affecting transparency: https://forums.pcsx2.net/Thread-A-Guide-on-How-to-Use-texture-dump-alpha-scaler-tool-and-How-to-Install-Python?pid=629788 More info on Editing with Gimp here: https://gbatemp.net/threads/tutorial-how-fix-broken-transparency-after-upscaling-with-gimp.647007/

if a lot of textures are suddenly broken, like transparency issues then it's because the upscaler moved a non-alpha channel pixel into a spot with an alpha channel in it, breaking the texture. You can try re-rendering the textures as PNG instead of DDS to see if this fixes it. If that fails then try upscaling those specific textures with a different model. If that fails then you'll either have to manually remaster the texture in a photo editor like Photoshop or gimp, or just delete the texture and don't upscale it.

If you're having a hard time finding a specific texture from a level, you can try sorting by Dimensions (it's not listed by default. You have to right-click while inside the folder then "sort by" then "more..." and check Dimensions) or date. Dimensions will show the biggest textures (in relation to screen space, not storage space) first, while date will show the images dumped in chronological order, the latter is useful for things like looking through a bunch of 2D art all at once such as concept art, to make it easy to just multi-select them in the folder later.

if you plan on using different models for a certain pattern of similar-looking textures I'd recommend making 2 copies of the images by ctrl-clicking the images in the folder (this takes a while) and putting them in a separate folder, one as a base "Unmodified" folder and another for the modified textures.

You can organize the replacements folder with folders like Environment, Fonts, Characters, Concept Art, etc. It will still read the replacements folder correctly, just keep the image filenames the same(dumps folder won't work so make a copy, just in case)

Here is the recommended dump/replacements folder structure for sharing(backup your dumps folder before re-organizing in case you need to add more dumps to it):

HUD = DDS-RGBA | Gallery/artwork(no-gameplay) = PNG | Everything else = DDS-BC7(with or without mipmaps). HUD is typically in-game so it would impact performance and it is usually very small in size and quantity so uncompressed DDS is best. Gallery/Artwork is usually in a non-resource-intensive environment so performance doesn't matter and PNG saves on space compared to RGBA. Everything else can benefit from BC7's optimization (DDS is lossy while PNG is lossless)

and here is the optimal folder structure if time isn't an issue:

HUD | Levels/1,2,3,4,5,...etc. | Characters | Gallery/Artwork

We export to DDS because it's optimized for VRAM usage in 3D Applications and can include mipmaps in the texture file itself.