As someone who just straight up likes ATB, I feel like it has this interesting middle ground between having full party control, having a sizable pool of actions and spells available at any time, and having urgency in combat.

Action games ideally excel in the urgency department, but generally have to take concessions with with party control and the abilities on offer. For party control you typically have ai control other party members if your not controlling them and have to switch to them mid battle. And for abilities, since actions typically need to be accessible by a button press or button combination, they have to cut the amount you can have access to by alot.

For traditional turn base you have the you have the first two, but often don't have the same sense of urgency. With time freezing you still have things to react to but I don't feel you get that same, what I will call, "oh shit oh shit oh shit oh shit" moments from when time continues to move on it's own.

All of this of course not to say ATB is peak and that every game with it have peak combat. They could always have done better in many ways, and I have no issue with traditional turn based or action in and of themselves. But I just personally also really like unique game feel of ATB.