Wobblegong

All enjoyment is to personal taste, of course, but yeah I'd say FFXIV is one of the best MMOs by far. I'd say it's tied with Elder Scrolls Online for sheer story/narrative-ness (though they're very different in genre, delivery, vibes, etc). FFXIV's is very unskippable: almost everything is unlocked via or tied so deeply to story progression that you cannot meaningfully play this game without doing the Main Scenario Quests. (I'm sure there's some sickos (affectionate) out there finding edge cases, but for normal play...) That said the story is also widely regarded as pretty heckin' good (again, to personal taste) so this isn't an act of violence against the players the way it'd be in, say, WoW.

You can level/play EVERY combat/crafting/whatever class on a single character, no alting required. (Altaholics consider this a drawback) Combat is MMORPG real-time combat, but it revolves around a 2.5-second global cooldown, so it's on the slow side for modern MMOS. Not to say it doesn't get hectic in harder content, but your APM doesn't have to be bonkers, which I (a person who can't go that fast) very much enjoy.

FFXIV is also 127 smaller games in a trench coat. There's a Fall Guys collaboration on right now– yes, the rainbow beans party game– and it slotted in absolutely perfectly because we already had the "unhinged minigames you could spend all your time on if you wanted" thing™ for them to staple it to. You know how in most MMOs crafting is, like, go prod gathering nodes (or the AH) until you can spam another 20-200 crafts to make bar go up? [thousand-mile stare] ...it is not so rudimentary here. For one thing, each crafting class is a CLASS. For another, they spent three expansions nerfing the difficulty curve so regular people could do it, then implemented the REALLY difficult stuff for sickos (affectionate) who want to experience pain. I've met people who play just so they can do crafting and gathering.

Anyways, the start/earliest part of FFXIV (2.0 as the kids say) is widely panned as its weakest/worst content, but the cool solution to that is the game offers an unlimited free trial that goes to [checks notes] Stormblood & level 70 cap. So you can play through the base game (2.0) and two expansions, which will take you from the stuff a lot of people are unenthused by up to the point where it is quite good. With no time limits on either /played or RL elapsed, too, so you can go at your own pace. (Let me be clear here: that much game is easily 80-200 hours of playtime if you're taking it as it comes. There's famously a number of players who have been on the free trial for years because there is just that much free game if you're into it.)
And if you hate it you're out $0.

ps. While it is a Final Fantasy game, you do not need to know or care about the franchise to enjoy it: I care very little about other FF titles but I'd loved FFXIV for years now.

I know I'm not the person you asked to shill the game to you, but: if you have time, watch the Dark Knight job quests.

(content warning for implied/threatened sexual assault in the first mission, but the player character prevents anything bad from happening)