I thought it was good after my first full game. My ongoing game is actively harrowing.
I'm playing as Wilhemina (and liking the Dutch bonuses, though Polders are indeed almost impossible to find sites for - I'm on a large island - large enough for 7 cities - and so all coast, and I have all of one suitable polder spot). Half the world hates me but I have good long-term relations with Macedon and Greece, and now alliances. I rapidly entered a Classical Dark Age but crawled out into a Heroic Age in the Medieval era, only to fall back again in the Industrial (now in a Modern Normal Age having just missed the Golden Age threshold). Early on Korea triggered an emergency by seizing Bandar - unfortunately I was the only one to respond, and when I got there found it was unexpectedly well-defended. Lots of money for Korea.
All the action has taken place on the island to my west - I first settled Leiden close to Korea, so needed to ensure I managed loyalty (they weren't too close, though). Korea, allied to Antananarivo just east of Leiden, went to war and Tana eventually razed the city (Korea soon replaced it in the exact spot). I built up a navy with the intent of attacking Tana - unfortunately, my spy sent on the new Fabricate Scandal mission to get rid of Korean envoys succeeded just as I took down the wall. That made me suzerain and prevented me from finishing that war. In the meantime I took out two Korean coastal cities - loyalty issues wouldn't let me keep them, but I considered that razing them would reduce the loyalty support of Daejeon (the Korean city that replaced Leiden); also Tamar then expanded into one of the vacant spots, which would help push Korea's loyalty down. That way, once Tana was mine, I wouldn't be dealing with loyalty issues of my own and could hopefully pressure the Korean city - Korea's got a much bigger, higher-tech army than me so military conquest will be hard.
Once the Korean cities were down, Tana was once more under Seondok's sway so I launched an attack and took it, to find a cavalry corps and two hwachas waiting. My naval superiority vanished when Korea brought out an ironclad - I had no access to coal, and had to wait until I could promote my Magnus governor to circumvent the need for it (not sure if it's a bug, but once Magnus gets this promotion you also get the ability to upgrade your existing units anywhere in your territory - at least, unless Tana had coal I wasn't aware of).
Still, I took Antananarivo at the cost of only one of my unique frigates (still not going to try typing out the name). So far so good, and though the Korean cavalry was a threat the AI had already shown it took longer than it ought to to capture cities and I had more frigates in production or en route. Only suddenly, an emergency triggered demanding that my rivals liberate Antananarivo. Seondok and Saladin accepted, and Seondok actively pushed for the city. I didn't have forces in place to stop her, and despite her odd reluctance to use her hwacha she took the city back ... yet more Korean gold.
At this point I'm basically committed to a path of militarising in order to destroy Korea altogether, retaking Tana, taking Daejeon (destined to be renamed Leiden) and any other suitable cities along the way.
I haven't had any gameplay this immersive in Civ VI before - not only that but I'm actually needing to make real strategic decisions and getting punished for making the wrong ones, another novelty for Civ VI. As the above breakdown shows every new feature of R&F has come into play in this session (though I've been perhaps too passive with governors - and I'll definitely need to get Victor at some point). Although loyalty hasn't actually come into play in terms of its mechanical effects it's done exactly what it's supposed to - informed my settling decisions, deterring me from settling distant islands, and dictated much of my strategy for neutralising Korea.
I'm sliding down the science rankings and there's a fair chance the game won't be winnable without going full domination to curtail Saladin and Tamar as well as Seondok (who's already suffering as one of the razed cities was a 15-pop core city - as an aside, razing seems unnecessarily punishing. The Civ V system where cities gradually burned unless recaptured at least gives the AI some chance to take a major city back), but the process of getting to the end game is much more interesting than the usual eureka-hunt-and-press-End-Turn.
Also, they cover the surface more accurately than squares.
