I'm back to playing Xenosaga II now. It's been years since I last played, and I'm happy to be picking it back up. I have these things to add/change:
The model complaint is ridiculous. The characters look far better across the board. No more bug-eyes and awkward proportions. The only arguable cases are Shion and KOS-MOS, and that's really up to whether or not you prefer anime-style. They do not look like shit. Also, Shion looks like she could actually be related to Jin, unlike the first game, where they look nothing alike.
I retract my statement about XSIII being faster. It's not. I'm actually clearing out enemies pretty quick in XSII. Less than a minute in a lot of cases. Animations are quick, too, while still looking good and transitioning smoothly. (XSIII, on the other hand, has Microsoft Powerpoint-esque transitions between attacks and some awkward pauses. Presentation-wise, it doesn't look as nice.) It helps that many of the Tech skills from XSI are now regular attacks. The fact that each character has specialty attacks and attack types encourages using different formations and characters for each situation. Enemies in this game aren't given huge HP pools, so taking them out isn't a long process. One to two turns can usually do it(of course, varying by enemy type and strength). Bosses are a different story, but those are bosses. That said, this is the one game in the series where you can kill bosses in single turn, so that point only applies to a general context. A technical mess, this is not. It works very well, provided that you know what you're doing. Kind of reminds me of FFXIII, in a sense.
Also, E.S. battles are much more simple due to lack of the break system, so to suggest that there are more tactics to use in E.S. battles is just blatantly wrong. They're much more straightforward.
As far as stocking is concerned, and I've said this before, it's not required to take out enemies. You will frequently be rewarded with stock for breaking enemies. Stocking once isn't too far out of the question, though, since it can be used to set up.
Load times aren't long. Noticeable, but not long. Again, XSIII's are comparable.
I'm glad XSI & II are separate games. I really like the changes they made to the second game. The skill system overhaul, the additions to the battle system, the inclusion of more side quests, the improvement of the menus(I don't have to go to through three menus to change party leaders; it's much faster), simplifying the equipment system, tutorials for the new systems– There's a lot of places where I can see improvements. I wouldn't have enjoyed another XSI nearly as much, I think. It's unfortunate neither II nor III were finished, but I can at least enjoy what we do have. I'm going to be bummed out going back to XSIII, though. I can feel it.
On a side note, the presentation of this game matches that of the first game. Cutscenes are well done, and the animations in them are pretty nice. Voice acting's flat at times, though. That might just be Canaan's voice actor. Regardless, the first hour of the game is so good. I really believe that this game is unfairly judged.