It's got tons of new stuff, but it's not really playable yet. Tarn Adams said it would be buggy, and it is indeed buggy. Not cute bugs, like "creatures aren't being burned properly in magma and are drowning while their fat runs out of them like a rotisserie chicken."* More bugs like "it crashes and you lose an hour of play" or "macedwarves can barely kill things anymore". It's disappointing.

Is there a way to say you're disappointed by a buggy alpha release of a free game and NOT sound like an asshole? I don't think there is.

I just don't know another way to describe almost getting something you've been looking forward to for a long time, only to find out it doesn't work yet. Dwarf Fortress is always charmingly unpolished, but I've never hit any bugs that stopped me from having fun before this release. I'm impatiently waiting for another release.

*this is a real bug