Sony today posted the backwards compatibility list for the PAL PS3, which has no PS2 hardware, unlike the current NTSC models.

Roughly 72% of all PS1 and PS2 games will work with the PAL PS3, but not all perfectly. Each posted game is rated as having “no known issues”, “some minor issues”, or “noticeable issues”. Most of the biggest games will play just fine with no known issues, like God of War 1&2, Shadow of the Colossus, and most of the GTA series.

However, some fairly big games have issues. GTA San Andreas has “noticeable issues”, as goes Gran Turismo 3 and 4. Katamari Damacy won’t play at all.

Hopefully Sony will stay on top of this with some firmware updates. It’s better than Xbox 360 backwards compatibility already, which Microsoft will admittedly abandon in the near future.