The man is making some good sense. I studied all three games and i love em all to pieces, but I gotta say, you ever notice most people play the start of Xenogears, stop, then months/years later play the start again? The game has really bad pacing, it takes over an hour to even get into a fight and even longer to get into an exciting fight, and hours to get into a mech fight.
I still haven't finished the game, but I can't say the reason I've started/stopped/started again is because of pacing. In fact, my absolute favorite part of the game is still, even after having finished over half the game, the very beginning in Lahan village before the fighting even starts. And that's just because of the totally innocent atmosphere.
Not saying you're wrong about the pacing, just that that's never been the problem with it for me.
Personally though, I'd still say the idea of good or bad pacing in an 80+ hour long RPG is kind of a joke anyway. What with the presence of level-grinding, exploration, item hunting, and side-questing, the pace is dictated very much by the player. Can't really see why an RPG fan would have a problem with that anyway, since progressing at your own pace has always been one of the appeals of the genre itself.
EDIT: ...like AG said. Sorry, only skimmed his post befre typing that.