If I've never played how could I know if I was interested or not? :P

That hasn't been the case since the first 2 games in the series. (Even then, I find that I actually *like* that style of gameplay, though for FF1 I actually prefer the Easy mode of Origins.)

I've tried FF7 and FF8, they did very much look like grindfests to me. To be honest, I haven't finished a single FF game, but that's because I honestly, truly, find them deathly boring.

You can actually watch the review or gameplay.
stop trolling you evil tentacle.

When playing FF7, I did a little of what you refer to "grinding", and I found that that made the game even easier than it already is. (I was aiming at learning Life2, for those curious.)

I'm not a troll, I'm just an idiot because I never thought of watching a video. DUH! :P

What FF would you recommend I investigate?

My favorite is definitely Final Fantasy 5.

Contrary to popular opinion, you don't *need* to "grind" in that game, but it is fun unlocking new abilities. On the other hand, the job commands (which you get just by being in the job) are good enough to beat the game.

(I would recommend learning 2-handed from Knight and !Mix from Chemist, but neither takes a ridiculous amount of AP to learn.)

If you have never played FF.. i would suggest FFX remastered.
I wanna suggest FF7 but the graphic might throw you off.

and FF is not for people with short attention span.

Well, FFXII was pretty good, but different. Actually I have hated the game, when I played it for the first time, when it was released, but few years again, after I replayed every FF game except III, which I never finished, I actually enjoyed the game.

Even better is the FFXII International Zodiac Job System, but this game was released in Japan only. But the game was rebalanced and the big ability grid for all characters was changed into Job Specific Grid, which made the game more FF-like.

I can recommend it, but due to the demise of the director in middle of development time, the first half of the game is much better quality than latter half :(

Try out on your own risk.
Many different opinions on it. Myself, I would recommend you FFIX or if you are not crazy into graphics, I would probably recommend you FFV as a second choice, because it was IMO the best game in series in classic graphics.

Many many people would say FFVI or FFVII, but well, I dis not liked FFVI, and FFVII is something everyone played, well except you :P I liked it, but I will always prefer FFIX over anything else in the series.

I have a few favourites like Tactics,IV and III.
My only gripe with the early ones were the insanely high encounter rates but after VI it seems to be sorted out.

Just watch Spoony's reviews :)

I've always liked seeing the stuff you recognize throughout all the FF games: chobobos, a guy named Cid, weapons and armors that you know are powerful (ultima weapon, ragnarok, excalibur, maximillion armor, etc), summons like Bahamut