yeah that was my concern reading anything I could find. The head will fit but no idea on the piston design between the two. Given they look almost identical other than the AVCS I would hope they didn't change anything else but no clue. I don't think the owner wants to take the chance so he will probably try a shortblock already done.
Working on a family members 08 Impreza with non turbo ej253. Somehow it had low compression on a cylinder leading into the crank case. I didn’t find anything obvious but noticed rod bearing was also trashed. Sunwest has short block for 1200 and thinking that might be easier than finding a local machine shop that will touch a subie.