Played pretty much all the FF games there are, except some of the never tactics editions, the FF7 spin-offs(because of how the mess with the original storyline and art-style), 11(P2P mmo's don't sit well with me) and the Crystal Chronicals series, and Legends/Saga or whatever name they go by these days.
If I had to rate them:
FF1-3 - Great by the standards of its time - shait by todays standards, all rank pretty much the same in my eyes.
FF4 - The first FF game to have a story and character development worth talking about. A good game.
FF5 - Took a step backwards in terms of story and character development, but was a good game all the same.
FF6 - Great game. I'd probably rank this is high as 7, if it wasn't for the poorer graphics, and sometimes
messy exploration elements.
FF7 - The best game in the series. Was groundbreaking in its time. Good, in many ways, even by todays standard,
if we ignore poor translation, dated graphics and dated sound.
FF8 - Very good, but took a step back in terms of story and characters, and contrived combat/magic system. Kept everything else that was good though, and improved on sound and graphics.
FF9 - Very good. Took a step up from FF8 in terms of story and characters, but I felt it tried to hard to play on nostalgia of fanbase, by it's return to nes/snes era style, which never really sat well with me to begin with. Magic system slighly annoying, and the encounter rates unbearable.
FF10 - Great. Sound and graphics, top notch. Story and character development was great too, even if I disliked much of the cast. The combat/magic system was great, the only one a really enjoyed since FF7. Took a great step back in terms of mini-games/additional gameplay elements, and in terms of exploration though.
FF12 - Good. It was a good rpg, it just wasn't a good FF game. Difuse, and unengaging story. Next to no character progression. Bland soundtrack. Great graphics though, and the gameplay was ok.
FF tactics - Great game. Although, as a strategy rpg, I think it falls short compared to Vandal Hearts in all departments except for the class system. It also has some major balancing issue.
Personally, I though FF13 was ok.
It ranks the same way FF12 did to me - namely, ok as a game, but shait as FF-game.
If they'd put another name on the cover, I'd probably go "Well, this is ok". The cover however, says Final Fantasy, and that raises the bar. Unfortunately, it raised the bar above the quality of the game.
Loved the graphics, and thought the story was ok. The characters, although I didn't much like any of them, where believable in a sense, which I though was a breath of fresh air considering how often characters in Jrpgs, IMO are often completely out of touch with how real people would act given their scenarios. So a small pluss for the writing, which is a step forward compared to the non-existent character development in FF12.
Finally, the soundtrack was ok.
That's all the positive I can say for the game really.
As for the negative:
Gameplay-wise it was shit.
The linearity destroyed any sense of grand avdenture that FF games have always tried to give off.
Combined with the lack of minigames/extra scenarios(like the FF7 bike scenario, snow board, submarine etc),
npc interaction, and town/world-map exploration, any time spendt on the non-battle portion of the game was rendered extremely boring, and made into a vacous process that served no other purpose but giving us a pretty "loading screen" on the way to the next battle.
Now, if the story was more than "just ok", and the battle system was completely awesome, then I might not have cared all that much. That isn't the case however.
The battle system was very pretty to look at, but the fact that you only control one character at the time, makes the game feel extremely restrictive and limited in terms of strategical aspects as compared to the earlier FF games.
The AI contolled partners aspect, further pulls it down. If I wanted to program A.I's and have a computer do my gaming for me, I wouldn't be gaming in the first place - I'd be in robot engineering.
The last grudge is how short the game is, and how due to its linearity and combat centered nature, it has less to no replay value. Rather than paying todays prices for a game(and rpg no less), that only lasts for 10-20 hours, of which there is no point in going through several times, I'd rather buy something else altogether.
But all in all, even with this gripe - just for the graphics, the soundtrack, and the story, I'm still temped to say that the game warrants a single playthrough. Even more so, if it wasn't named Final Fantasy.
However, it is a FF game, and by that note, a poor one at that.
The thing that provokes me the most though, is how "easy"(it might take a long time, but it's far from impossible) it would be to make the game much better.
Add some towns and npc interaction. Add something similar to a world map, with some exploration elements.
Putt in some mini-games or additional gameplay elements to break up the pace and liven up the gameplay formula.
Get Nobuo to work on the soundtrack.
Had they done that, I'd probably rate the game that much higher. They didn't, and that in my mind, lowers my opinion of the game, and the creators that much more.
Now, with Xenoblade, and The Last Story(arguably one of the best Jrpg since FF10, and IMO better than most, even counted psx/ps2 era), it just struck me how much square-enix has screwed over the franchise.
As much as I want a FF7 remake - I wouldn't want one made by these jokers.