does Aurora still work? Last few times I tried, I couldn't install anything.

Last used yesterday found no problem to install random application.

It did yesterday, for me. Sometimes it doesn't work for a while and the dev needs some time catching up to what Google deliberately or inadvertently or indifferently put in the way of access to the place where apps are published (and they are published there, not because app creators deliberately chose Google out of many app distributors in some healthy competitive market; there is no choice).

The Aurora project accepts donations, if you want to hurry things along some time! And they have a donation button right there in the app listing, try doing that for yourapp in the PlayStore and see who comes knocking in 3...2..1 to make you a non-person.

It works. I see updates from just 3 hours ago, and generally updates have been pretty constant (I use Shizuku for auto-updates) though manual updates sometimes fail.

It has gotten better if anything. I used to have much more problems with it before.

Less strict in some ways, more strict in other ways. Izzy hates vibecoded apps. Ironically F-Droid official seems more tolerant