E.S. Guide
E.S. robots are giant machines which resemble humans, they can be used for flight and combat. You'll start Xenosaga Episode II in the
E.S. Asher, but after that short introduction to
E.S. Battles you won't be able to play as an E.S. robot again until the beginning of
Disk 2.
E.S. robots, like normal characters attack using
Square and
Triangle, however E.S.'s don't have the option to use Circle, the reason for this is because when you are in an E.S. Battle
Zones do not apply. Square button will take your E.S. robot into close combat and strike them at close range, whilst Triangle button will fire either a gatling gun round or a laser beam from a distance.
During an E.S. Battle you can have the choice to
Stock, however when stocking instead of been able to use another attack after pressing either Square or Triangle you'll notice that the
Red Gauge below the E.S.'s HP will increase instead. Everytime you use the Stock command this gauge will increase by
100.
The maximum it can reach, without an
EMAX300 is 200 and once it's at either 100 or 200 you can press the
X button whilst on the battle screen and select the
Special Command. This will give you a choice to use one of up to three special attacks, which are much more powerful than your standard attacks.
To get a third attack you'll have to charge you
Stock Gauge up to 300, but to do this you'll need to equip the special item to your chosen E.S. called EMAX300. These can be got after special E.S. robot boss fights, the first one you get from beating the last E.S. on the
Ormus Stronghold during Disk 2.
What special attacks your E.S. has all depends on which character is co-piloting the E.S., for example when you have
Jin as your co-pilot your special attack will be
Wings of Light. To find out which special attacks an E.S. will have go to the
Tech menu by pressing
Triangle whilst on the field. To change to co-pilot go to the
Party menu and select the character you want to subsitute, then press
Circle on the character you want to replace them for.
Unlike
Character Battles you can only use two E.S. robots at a time, whilst in character battles you can have 3 characters. The E.S.'s that you can use are the
E.S. Asher, the
E.S. Dinah and the
E.S. Zebulun. The E.S. Asher is prodominately based on offence, whilst the E.S. Dinah is based on defence and because of this the Dinah doesn't deal as much damage as the E.S. Asher. The E.S. Zebulun however is different, it's the only E.S. that can use
Ethers. The Ethers it can use all depends on who is co-piloting it, so I suggest that you have
MOMO and
Shion pilot the Zebulun due to them having the best Ether skills.