The shifter is a little funky and I don't care for the steering wheel, but those are very minor gripes. Looks like a winner to me!
I don't think the fact that it's based on a FWD platform with AWD standard in the US will hurt it at all. Every CUV in its class is FWD-based, and frankly the buyers in this segment probably don't care/know the difference anyway.
And yes, BMW has been offering 2WD on the X lineup for a year now. AWD isn't needed in southern states where you might get snow/ice 5 days the whole year and when it does happen everything gets shut down so you aren't on the road anyway.