I think that Rebirth Island is a straight downgrade to Alcatraz, and the majority of the changes made were awful or buggy.
The first major issue I have with this map is performance. I have a 2024 iPad Pro, and I'm getting stuttering/frame drops. Idk how bad that is on touch, but for controller it's a big issue since framerate is directly tied to sensitivity. If I had to guess, it's probably due to the huge oversaturation of items on the map. You can see from my screenshot how littered the rooftop was, and every floor on the map was like this. There's just way too many items for the game to render, and we don't need 5 cash drops directly next to each other, or 5 weapons in a room. The scarcity Alcatraz had was perfectly fine, and it also made it the friendliest map to lower end devices. This is the first thing that needs to be fixed.
Next, the new BR elements and the map size. The map appears to be bigger, and it doesn't feel as fast paced as Alcatraz did. I think this is a downside, because the fast paced action was the entire selling point of the map. Not to mention the BR elements like cash are unnecessary. The goal was quick engagements and fast rounds. There isn't much need nor incentive to go utilize the cash, and frankly, having it pointlessly scattered everywhere detracts from the experience. I personally think they should remove it.
Next up is the starting pistol. For some reason MWII skins only apply after picking up the weapon off of someone else, and not when you spawn in. Probably a bug, but figured I'd note it.
Lastly the intro and exfil screens. Two things, one is that both the intro and exfil screens are needlessly long and wastes time compared to the old ones. The second is that characters no longer have their special intros, or their special dropship. I'm not sure if this is an oversight, or if they are adding this later. However, it is a middle finger to anyone who purchased mythic or legendary characters, and we all know those aren't cheap. They need to fix that.
Anyway, thank you for anyone that took the time to read this. I hope Activision or Timi takes the time to address some of the issues with the new map. I know I was quite negative, but with some work I think the map could be decent. However, more than that, I really hope they bring back Alcatraz. Many people (myself included) only enjoy that one specific map for BR, because of it's uniqueness. The current update removed that, so I am hoping that someone will see this and bring it back. Both it and Rebirth can co-exist