I got the short end of the stick with XCOM's psionic soldiers. I sent every soldier I had into it and came out with one. The game compared my stats to the rest of the world, averaging between 3 and 4. My 'one' soldier however was the lone soldier that survived the game's tutorial. It was a Heavy from Argentina, a rookie who was promoted to Squaddie after every member of his team died.

And I let some soldiers die. But for whatever reason, whatever slight chance, Sergio Ramirez kept surviving. And as he ranked up the more valuable I viewed him. Yeah, others were promoted too, but it was Sergio who not only went on the most missions, but also racked up the most kills. And he was the lone soldier who was gifted with psionic powers. A badass Argentinian man with a short mohawk and a heavy plasma rifle, and I went to town man.

And when that final cinematic played out I was glad that Sergio Ramirez was with me from the start, until the end. It made the journey feel kind of personal in that 'tell your own story' kind of way. He literally became the face of MY XCOM experience. There's no real forced narrative in XCOM, it's almost entirely focused on gameplay, but you start to tell yourself a story, and seeing that rookie who was panicking and unable to shoot straight become the most valuable asset of humanity felt cool. It could have been any soldier. I could have lost Sergio in an earlier portion of the game and just moved on. But he was the only constant for me in XCOM, a game that's essentially based on randomization and the unexpected. And if I were to play again, I won't have Sergio there with me, leading the squad to victory. It'd be some other guy or girl. Hell, I'll probably skip the tutorial if I play again, and that would mean there won't be a lone survivor to have to begin with.

But after 34.4 hours folks, XCOM: Enemy Unknown is complete on the first playthrough. And what a fine game it turned out to be!