JeeperGirl said it best in her review on the Carnival form - The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.
PRICE - The price was great for us. In fact, it was super cheap. BUT ... you get what you pay for.
VIBE - When we first boarded, the vibe was good. There appeared to be a good mix of people and ages. By Day 2 we realized that we were on a Spring Break cruise in November. Saw people rudely demanding bar service at 8 am or earlier often.
Cabin was fine for what this cruise cost us. Our cabin steward was exceptional. We would not have booked a balcony and paid extra if we had known at the time of booking that smoking regulations were going to change on October 9 to disallow balcony smoking. We very much thank our booking agent for getting us a cabin literally one floor immediately below the Lido deck smoking area.