XCOM 2: War of the Chosen - Why am I not Excited?

So, there was an announcement lately about the upcoming XCOM 2 full expansion, and a lot of people were really excited. Like, I got into a discussion with this tool on the sub-reddit who bitched about being downvoted because he wanted to harsh that excitement.

But the truth of the matter is, I'm not excited, either. There's some really cool stuff in the expansion! But like, I don't care about the main stuff. The Chosen, the new enemy classes, the resistance groups... All of that stuff leaves me cold. The aspects I like seem like afterthoughts; The cameraderie system, the depth on the strategic layer.

So I'd like to take a little time to think about why that is. I already have a general idea, but I think it'll take a little unpacking to get to the root of things.

What I love about XCOM, aside from having a fairly fun tactical game, is the potential for procedural storytelling. There's the main storyline, immutable, but the characters you take through it are yours, and will be different each time. You can take those moments of heroism and loss, and weave personal narratives around them, if you're so inclined. Hell, I have half a XCOM: Long War campaign (languishing due to redirected focus on XCOM 2 and some really disheartening technical problems) built entirely on the stories of the troopers as they fight, win, and die to save their world.

To this end, Bradford, Vahlen/Tygan, the Shens, are secondary. The commander, for me at least, is secondary. I also don't really care about the alien rulers as anything other than things that my troopers, my main characters, encounter and have to deal with.

This is why I was really disappointed by how they chose to implement Psionics in XCOM 2. This is why SPARKS don't interest me at all. It's hard to care about a trooper who spends most of their time in a glowing purple cube, and about a machine purpose-built for war. Psions and genemods (even MECTs, though I wasn't a big fan of those, either) were the same troopers you shepherded up from hapless rookies to being the saviors of humanity.

So why does War of the Chosen fail to excite me? Because it adds more main characters, more special characters. The troopers you get are special, different; I have a feeling they'll be much like Psions, with their alternate advancement track. They're also going to come in mid-game, but be given emphasis; Mid-game characters, IMO, should be rookies coming in to fill in the ranks, unsure of their place and in awe of the battle-hardened veterans they're fighting beside. The hero classes... aren't that. They're Van Doorn, who I know everyone loved; They're expected to steal the spotlight, and I don't like it.

The same is true of the Chosen. I am NOT interested in main characters, even on the enemy side. Give me something akin to Shadow of Mordor's Nemeses, which I understand the Chosen are partly based on, and let *me* imbue the enemy with personas, accomplishments and near-miss defeats.

XCOM's story has never been especially strong, though it's always been enjoyable enough. It's always shined, for me and many others, when the players have been able to take ownership of the characters, even the named, voiced characters, and make the story their own. I'm beginning to think that Jake Solomon and crew have either forgotten that, or never quite understood it and happened upon a beautiful formula by accident. The Anarchy's children expansion, as goofy as it was, was a step in the right direction; The camaraderie system mentioned in WotC is another step in the right direction. Alien Hunters, Shen's Last Gift and now the main content of WotC seems like a big step in the wrong direction.

Don't get me wrong. I'm sure I'll play it, and I'm sure I'll enjoy it. I'll be able to tell myself (and perhaps others) some beautiful, tragic stories of death and pyrrhic victory that will incorporate this new content, but I just cannot get excited about it, and I have a feeling that I'm not the only one who feels this way.