Its hard to say for me between 2nd gen and 3rd gen.
2nd gen had Final Fantasy IV and Final Fantasy VI which were both of my first FF games I played (and finished) - both were on the SNES, my 2nd most favorite Nintendo platform and both games are in my top 5. Though V is a good game , it is far less good compared to the other two.
2nd gen also had weird spinoff FF games such as FF Legends (SaGa), Final Fantasy Adventure (Mana 1) and Final Fantasy Mystic Quest though they had FF in the name, they were less Final Fantasy than even FFXVI which people are debating over right now.
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3rd gen had Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy IX which were two of my most favorite FF games - they are both on top 5 list and I played both so many times. This is soured by Final Fantasy VIII which I consider to be one of the worst Final Fantasy experiences I had (alongside 2 and X-2).
However this gen also had Final Fantasy Tactics which on its own is an amazing game.
So I decided to vote on 3rd gen mainly because of VII, IX and Tactics over 2nd gen which has IV and VI for me.
