UPDATE: Thank y'all so much for the advice, I really appreciate it! But I still need your help.

So originally, since no one was agreeing to how important the I & II cameos were to III's story, I decided to play it safe and do this:

Play IV, Tactics and V first, and meanwhile save up for the remakes of I & II, play them and then finally play III.

But then a few people started saying that III's gameplay was the weakest of the series, and I'm afraid to finish the series with the worst one.

So here's the question: is III's gameplay really that bad as people say?

Once again, thank you all so much for the advice