Hi,
I'm not a fan of the Challenge missions, because i prefer to feel the attachement to MY team, and it will be broken while playing another team even for one mission. But why not. If i can skip them.
Porting to Consoles is almost never a good news for PC players... GUI is tuned down to fit the limited gamepad, gameplay is tuned down because consolers are consolers, graphics are tuned down because machines are always less powerful than a good PC and often stuck for years, etc.
The zoom is nice and a very welcome addition.
I don't know about the subs and base part, as i didn't play with it yet, but i like the idea of a "meta-layer", just like geoscape/battlescape and base/team building from another very famous tactical game...
Would be great if the world was alive with a timer (turn based or real time), with mission you have to complete before the end of the timer (but don't do timed mission, please, only timed world events...). ie there is a small gang somewhere, you kill them, gone. You don't, the small gang has a strong chief now. You don't do anything, the gang may absorb another gang, attack an outpost, kidnap someone, terror-attack somewhere...
Little by little, you may lose reputation (less mercs maybe), opportunities (the slaves can't be freed anymore, the shop is destroyed, the friendly city is corrupted, the lost sub you could get for free belongs now to the gang...), and the small local gang becomes a big final boss to reach the end of the current region.
Well, i guess it won't happen because it's a lot of work, but hey, would be awesome !