how do you make it work

i have downloaded some playstation games, i assume for the PS1, newbie question, how do i actually make them work once i have downloaded, do i need some sort of software to read the downloads??

Yes you will need an emulator (tool for playing ROMS).
The best as some will say is the ePSXE (tut stickied on this page).

You need a PSX Emulator.
ePSXe is the best one available.This tutorial will get you started.
https://www.romulation.org/forum/index.php?topic=8528.0

Well seems I've been beaten to this. But yes you will need the PSX Emulator, you will also find that to run the Emulator you will need a bios file and some plugins for the emulator.The instructions that TirithRR has linked you to should solve the problem if you read through them and follow them precisely.Just remember, not EVERY game will run perfectly on an emulator as there are still likely to be bugs here and there, but what can you expect from something that is free.

that's cool, thx for the help. is there a direction you can point me in as i want to back up the games to cd, so my son can play in his old PS1.

You just need a image ripping software, like IMGBurn.
http://www.imgburn.com/Put the disc in your CD drive, and choose create image from disc. It's fairly simple and works very well. I backed up all my Final Fantasy games (7, 8, 9, and Tactics) without any issues.

T, can i trouble you with 1 more question, once i have downloaded the game, what is the method to which i back it up, as in which of the programs i downloaded do i add and how and where do i attach the downloaded game to... thanks heaps Lozza

Copy it somewhere obviously?

done that, but it don't work.