XII was one of the first mainline games I played through, and I really got into it. After playing most of the rest, I get why it doesn’t come off as a “proper” FF game. That said, I always wanted more just like it. Perhaps a spinoff, or maybe ivalice alliance could be reinstated as a more tactics-focused FF franchise while the main line goes on doing… whatever it did for XVI.
This is what you get when parents absent-mindedly assume handing their kid a smartphone when they’re noisy is all it takes to raise them.