Which Final Fantasy to play?

well, quality-wise in terms of story and gameplay, it goes as follows:

7 > 6 > 10 > 9 > 5

the rest is utter crap if you ask me.

I feel like, if you didn't like VII you won't like VIII.
X/X-2 are total trash (to me). Tthis seems to be a generational divide or something. No one I know over 25 that played FF games before X likes X, most people I know younger where X or XII were their first FF games like X. That said, imo, X is utterly vapid, devoid of any feeling or depth, and revolves around pretty visuals. It is, imo, the absolute worst FF game ever (though XIII does give it a damn good run for the title).

Ergo, my suggestion is to go with either VI or IX.
VI has some of the best story imo, and IX was kinda an iconic (and short lived) return to the roots of FF for most. V is kinda my second place suggestion because of the job system.

One thing I'll note too... The port of FFVI is pretty unpleasant to me. I feel like the smoothed out sprites and the touch oriented menu system are absolutely terrible, but the game is still so good I don't care. FFV appears to be much more unchanged, so that could be a pro or a con depending on if you like the more modern style they "remaster" the sprites in. shrug

You should try 9 or 10 both have a nbice story and graphics and are easy to learn with hard to master battles if you get into one of them i am betting you will get back to ff 7 after a while and you will get into it also dont try to pick 13 and the newer ones ofr old fans of the franchise they are not considered good ff