Final Fantasy 1 - mediocre 2 - never played, but supposedly trash 3 - mediocre 4 - never played, but supposedly good 5 - great 6 - great 7 - good 8 - never played, but supposedly trash and friends told me to avoid 9 - never played, but supposedly okay 10 - never played; looks like trash and friends told me to avoid 11 - never played; looks like trash and friends told me to avoid 12 - never played; looks like trash and friends told me to avoid 13 - never played; looks like trash and friends told me to avoid 14 - good 15 - never played and know absolutely nothing about
Dragon Quest 1 - never played, but looks mediocre 2 - never played, but looks mediocre 3 - fantastic 4 - never played, but supposedly fantastic 5 - fantastic 6 - never played, supposedly bad - but I think it looks pretty okay 7 - okay 8 - never played, mixed reviews from people but friends told me to avoid 9 - okay 10 - never played and know next to nothing about, aside from it being an MMO 11 - great
I'm more interested in playing the Dragon Quests I haven't played than the Final Fantasies I haven't played. Dragon Quest 3 and 5 are better than the best Final Fantasy games. Final Fantasy Tactics is the best spinoff series, but the Torneko mystery dungeon series is better than the Chocobo mystery dungeon series -- and the Dragon Quest Monsters games aren't too far behind the Final Fantasy Tactics games. Both Dragon Quest of the Stars and Dragon Quest Tact are way better than Brave Exvius, Record Keeper, or War of the Visions.
Dragon Quest seems way more consistent, and Final Fantasy has had consistently bad looking games since the PSX era -- while Dragon Quest keeps upping the ante.
Sounds like your friends are morons, and you should make up your own mind instead of listening to others. Everyone is going to have a different opinion on what games are good and what games are horrible. My buddy loves Final Fantasy 8 while I think it was great up until about the halfway mark, 9 is arguably one of the best games in the entire series, and 10 actually is amazing. People just bitch about it because of 1 particular scene which was meant to be cringy in the first place. 11 wasn't bad, 12 is horrible/great depending on who you ask(I'm personally not a fan as I think the story is garbage, but I will admit it has arguably one of the best worlds in the entire series).
And Dragon Quest 8 is an awesome game, imo far better than Dragon Quest 11.