I played FF VIII first. Februrary of 2004. Okay so I started really late
My stepfather got some old PS1 games from one of his coworkers, VIII was amongst them, and I fell in love like that. I really didn't know that video games could be that rich in story and I loved the characters and the music as well.
After that I came across Tactics. Barely played that. I could only use auto battle and not fight by myself, so I said screw it and gave it up. Then I played VII. Another awesome game. This September I finally bought a PS2 and got X right away. I love that too, as much if not more than VIII. I rented DoC after my computer died and I had free time on my hands. I liked that. I rented XII and have played quite a bit of it. Another great game. I'm hoping to actually buy it by the end of this month.