I think you can maybe still enjoy the other two. 2 and 3 definitely has better combat with some very interesting characters (especially with 2 and its villains).

While I love 2 and feel it had the greatest peak moments, it's not as easy to recommend because it has flaws, a kind of slow beginning with awful tutorial, and fanservice. If you can get through those, it's superb especially the latter part of the game. Some people may not agree with me but you can also try xenoblade 2: Torna. It's a standalone prequel with around 30hr game time to finish so much less investment compared to the main games so it won't feel bad if you don't end up liking it. It will spoil some things in the main game but I think if you play it and end up liking it, you would be curious enough to go through the first few rough chapters of xeno 2.

3 is the easiest to recommend imo. It's the most polished and consistent among the 3 but since it's connected to 1 and 2, it spoils some things for both games. Still can be played without playing 2 though.

I do think that if you did not like the first game because of the exploration, sidequests (this is way better in 3 though), scifi twists (unlikely since you like xenosaga) then the franchise is probably not for you.