Tony Hawk for me. I spent hundreds of hours with that game and enjoyed every minute of it. The gameplay was perfect and just pure fun. The soundtrack was also pretty good. Some of those songs come to my mind until this very day every now and then.

The late '90s were slow for me, gaming wise. And looking at this list, I better understand why that was the case.

For me 8 was the first FF I did not like. Hated the draw system, hated the junction system, hated scaling enemies and hated most of the characters.

On a bright side I loved 9 and 10.

I didn't want to bother to learn the systems and just leveled up by grinding. I kept going like that until end of CD 3 where suddenly it was a boss fight I had no chance of winning not knowing what I was doing. Then I had to learn what I was supposed to have been learning along last 50 hours.

(Also note about that point: I could've saved myself into a dead end beyond a point of no return there and would've had to start all over from beginning, it was sheer luck I didn't.)

I wouldn't say I hated the characters, but they are... meh, forgettable. More so with the mess of a plot.

Still haven't played 9/10 (or any after), looking forward to getting on those one day.

IX is the best FF on PS1. 10 kinda sucks. 8 is fucking horrible. It's pointless to fight or level up. Story sucks. Characters suck. XII is ok but tbh not missing much if you play the Pixel Remasters then VII and IX and skip the rest. Oh except the Tactics games are great even tho the GBA one has questionable character design.

If you haven't played a Heroes of Might and Magic game, I would make it the next game you play.  My personal favorite is HoMM 2, but HoMM 3 is also a fantastic game, and it's the one that is easily the most popular.  Basically if you have ever liked a fantasy themed strategy game, then you should definitely play one of these HoMM games ASAP.

Rather harsh. 

In terms off FF games, all FF games are good, even great just some are more great than others. FF8's junction system was one of the easiest magic system to exploit if you actually spent time leveling Guardian Forces up correctly, this is why you needed to fight and level up. You need to level up GF to get item or card convert skills then fight to get items and cards to convert. Make high level magic, shove it on strength and suddenly you have a character doing like a few k damage per hit while you mage does 80 still. Is funny.

Story has time travel which can be confusing but isn't bad. At least things are explained and learnt well, Squall is dismissive but grows into his character as he needed to. What people much of the time don't like is the contrivances related to how characters know each other. 

And FF12 is superb. 

Honestly, play them all. Even 13, no matter how generic that is (looks nice).

FF games in general, from poorest to best are still some of the best games ever made.

9 is special. 10 is fun. 12 has the best battle system. 8 is hot garbage.

Every time FF comes up it's always the same: "FF? is amazing but FF> is the worst thing I've ever seen". Then the next guy is like "Nooo, FF> is great too, it's FF% which is actually bad". Then a third guy says "Actually, every game after FF& is terrible".

It's such a tired conversation. They're all at least good. If some of them don't quite appeal to you, then that's the price you pay for the innovation which brought you FFs you like! There's no need to be so hyperbolic.

No they really are not. After X and while I like 12 is falls apart in so many ways. Some of them are just bad games. 13 games are just terrible. XV is awful. Awful games with a AAA budget skin. 8 really is a pointless game and people pretend this series like Zelda doesn't just outright have terrible games. Unlike Zelda that series bounced back after years of mediocrity. It's ok to admit when a series well known or beloved can be outright shit and FF series fell hard. Better franchises have risen up. Persona. Xenoblade. Octopath. Trails. Ys are just much better series and more forward thinking than FF has been in 20-plus years.