I’ve been keeping tabs on this game since it was announced, and everything I’ve seen about it so far seems promising. It’s clearly xcom-inspired, they’ve confirmed permadeath roster management, and they seem to be hinting at the difficulty.

Why my optimism is cautious:

1. Star Wars games are some of the most hit-or-miss games out there. Sometimes they’re amazing, other times they’re incredibly mediocre.

2. We don’t know much about replayability. XCOM is extremely replayable because the generated maps, missions, enemy placement, etc. can make each run feel unique. If Zero Company’s missions are too story-driven and linear, I worry that I’ll bounce off of it.

3. While they’ve hinted at the difficulty, I really hope they’re not afraid to push the player (in whatever the challenge mode is). Many games phone-in higher difficulty modes by just tweaking health/damage sliders, unlike in XCOM, where they even brought in a dedicated director to make sure Legendary felt right.