Here is a Final Fantasy X-2 review I might have written back when it was released had I been so inclined to do that all those years ago. These are essentially 'my thoughts at the time' mined from my own subconscious. I've done my best not to let my present general outlook on everything affect my view from 'back then.'
I thought the dress sphere was, at the time, an interesting take on character swapping in the game.
In X, you could swap people in and out of your party on the fly, but in X-2, they substituted this mechanic with the dress spheres. That is, changing jobs on the fly rather than characters.
In a purely mechanical context, it's really no different.
It's just that it's 'dressed up' (heh) as the characters, three teenage girls of various personalities and temperments, changing clothes like magical girls to take on foes as required.
I think it's a clever idea, but you're really asking a lot of an international audience to just 'go with it.' The aesthetics aren't somethign people can just accept without reservation. Gameplay nazis will say it doesn't matter, but that's always beena broken argument: character designs, narrative, music, presentation, etc...all of this stuff DOES matter to the customers. It's only a minority that look at a video game like Neo and see vertically descending strings of code to be manipulated. I think a person that says 'get over it and play the game', especially a Final Fantasy game, is a weird guy/gal.
In terms of the story, this is the harder obstacle to overcome. This game is the first official sequel to any Final Fantasy game ever released. As such, it came with huge, HUGE expectations. And this is the first true instance of S-E's arrogance as game developers that I can remember. They made the game they wanted to make, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with that ideologically. But they seemingly did this in a vacuum, completely unaware of whether or not anyone would even like tie idea of running around the world of Spira as an idol singer trio getting in unimportant adventures, completing annoying side quests, bantering with cliched treasure hunter rivals and ultimately getting involved in the political intrigues of a world picking up the pieces after their entire religious/spiritual foundation has been eliminiated.
Oh, and you occasionally stop in to say hi to the characters from X that survived and see how they're doing.
I boldfaced that last comment above because this, independent of all the distracting side stuff and girly-girl storyline, sounds fucking magnificent as a narrative concept for a Final Fantasy sequel. The problem is that the game takes its own sweet time unboxing this element and distracting you with too many annoying other things to do so that when you finally get around to it, it just doesn't matter that much.
What do I think now?
Well, I look at it in the same way that I currently look at games like Resident Evil 6 and Devil May Cry 4.
Yes, they've taken some chances to try to infuse something fresh into the IP. No, it doesn't all work. Yes, some of it is so bad as to give me nerd rage.
All of that said, there is a LOT to like about Resident Evil 6, Devil May Cry 4 and Final Fantasy X-2.
My advice to you is to not 'want' or 'expect' anything out of Final Fantasy X-2. Take it for what it is and try to enjoy it on its own level. It IS ultimately a well designed game with some pacing issues and narrative missteps. You may not initially like the new characters, narrative focus or changes to gameplay. And it's fair to criticize that stuff. But there is more than enough to like about it that you should have no problem adopting an open minded view and kicking it with Yuna, Rikku and Paine for a little while. Even if Rikku looks like an ugly fucking skank in X-2. Just put a bag over her head.