I only completed this game last week, and after playing the newer games such as the Lightning trilogy and X/X-2 HD, it was a bit weird going back to PSX. The game seemed a bit more cliche as a Final Fantasy game, even going as far as making Kuja explicitly say "Mwahahaha". But I did enjoy a lot of it, I thought the banter between the characters was quite funny and laid back a lot of the time, and I thought some of the character relationships (or lack of) were cute, like Eiko's little crush on Zidane (seeing her dialogue "Zidane, I love you!" was satisfying because she finally said what she was trying to say all along).
The only reason I put it off for so long was because it wasn't long after playing VIII that I played X and I didn't want to go backwards, plus in ignorance I found the design a little childish, mainly because of Steiner looking so out of proportion compared to everyone else on the front cover. I feel satisfied I finally did play it though. I enjoyed the plot, even though some of it was a bit too familiar, like Memoria.