I have played Final Fantasy, mainly remakes/ports of the older titles. No mainline stuff past VIII yet, though X's sitting in my Steam library.

I felt like Final Fantasy V was about as hard as VII. This game was sorta the blueprint for the Bravely series mechanically. Lots of jobs to swap between and level. It's my personal favorite of the FFs I've played.

III maybe, but the whole final dungeon's a bit of a slog due to there being no save points inside and having to fight 6 bosses in a row. And it's just...a bit clunky.

Oh and maybe 4 Heroes of Light, the Bravely devs' spiritual predecessor. It's got some odd quirks, but they did a good job keeping things simple and it's very charming.