Stayed up until 11:30 last night, I tried to stay up passed 12 AM to preview it, but I was too tired. Today, I was 10 mins late for work, because I wanted to check out the first few turns this morning. I started a game as Rome, on prince, (I like to play on king, but I made it easier for my first time with the new content.) In advanced setup, I choose to play with all of the new Civs. So far, I was able to find Venice south of my capital. I noticed the barbarians have a cool new avatar during turn waiting; it looks more... barbaric. I can't wait to get home and play, this is going to be longest day of work since the debut of Gods and Kings.
On a side note, did anyone notice that the map generation looks better, and more realistic, or is it just me?
The barbarian avatar changed with the most recent patch (pre-bnw). I like the new map generation too. Also, since the patch turns go by so much faster! I hated the modern era on because it just turned into a slog.
Anyway, first game morroco, prince, standard everything on continents. I was the first with a religion (founded and enhanced before anybody else thanks to desert folklore). I decided to go widish with 7 cities. I started on a continent with Monty, Elizabeth, Alex, and Indonesia. Never gone to war but I've had one of the largest militaries most of the game (monty worried me). I'm raking in around 150 gpt from trade routes, all sea in the industrial era. I am currenlty the leader in just about everything and am trying to go for a cultural, but if that doesn't work out I'll switch to tech.
I love the new cultural victory, as well as trade routes. The new cultural victory makes it viable for a wide empire. It's also really nice that they toned down the penalty per city for social policies. Though I'm a little disappointed about the new tech penalty. :-(