tyra VS TR2Main

There is also a (relatively) easier method: tyra. Tyra is an engine: it does the hard work talking to the hardware for you. You can follow the various tutorials (if I remember well, they are in C++ language, that is quite similar to C, but I suggesto to read something about it anyway) and maybe in a few hours you will have something running on the Playstation2.

Need an graphics engine? There's tyra

Tomb Raider II / The Golden Mask - TR2Main https://github.com/Arsunt/TR2Main/releases

TR2Main. There's a folder called "Extra Options" that'll be in the install folder when you're done. They can add things like the animated item screen and PSX status bars. You can use the PC or PSX FOV.

If you plan to play TR2, go grab the TR2Main fan patch for it, makes it run nice and smooth with controller support if you want it. TR3 is the probably most annoying to make work, due to some bugs with keybinding and alpha blending. TR4 is a little better thanks to Tomb4Project, same with TR5 (Chronicles) and Tomb5. I couldn't get controllers to work with 3-5 so i just got used to keyboard controls. Speaking of keyboard controls, with 3-5 i've been rebinding sprint to num0, sprint to num1, duck to num2 and flares to num3, so you don't have to really take your fingers off the arrow keys.

I've been playing through the original ones, you can use community updates like Tomb1Main and TR2Main for controller support on PC. I played 1 and 2 using a wireless xbox one controller on PC, which was really nice.

Tr2Main fully supports gamepads natively.

TR2: https://github.com/Arsunt/TR2Main

For Tomb Raider II, there's a fan patch called Tomb 2 Main that also adds native support for modern versions of Windows, widescreen resolutions and the ability to activate some features from the PS1 version that are absent from the PC version.