From my experience, most western online shops set their prices pretty high compared to more unknown, Chinese wholesalers.
I probably could have bought the Aurora from somewhere more local, but as you say, the nearer the retailer/wholesaler, the more it'll cost you. Fortunately at least some Chinese wholesalers seem to have something inside their head, since they offer express shipping at a fair price. Me and my friend, for instance, gladly paid $22 extra for 4-9 day shipping compared to the standard China shipping time(usually 30 days to Sweden).

I'm not sure if ICS really are that much faster, of if the hardware simply evolves - there's a Gingerbread build for the Aurora that supposedly is very fast. However, ICS makes much more sense on a tablet IMO.

I can't really judge the battery life between ICS and Gingerbread, but the Aurora seems to have decent battery life. On Tuesday I used it from about 9 'o clock to about 11:30, and the battery went from 100% to about 60%. That is with Wifi on and screen on about 90% of the time. Idle should also be pretty good as I've set Android to turn off Wifi when the screen is off, unless the tablet is charging.

Re the missing games, it identifies itself as a Samsung Galaxy SII. It makes sense since they share the same GPU - meaning no games come up which won't work. I've tried a Motorola Xoom build.prop but Market didn't "re-recognize" my device as new one so I switched back.

Perhaps I haven't made clear what I use it for. Mainly, I was looking for something that can always be with me, whether in bed, commuting and so on. I usually browse a lot on my iPhone, but now I can simply share the iPhone's 3G connection and browse away on a vastly bigger screen. I also use it for comics/e-books, and with the IPS screen the experience is somewhat decent. I also play the occasional game, but that's not what I mainly use it for.
So far, it's been pretty nice. One thing which I've found pretty annoying is the glossy back, it gets very smudgy quick and laying it flat in your palm does not feel very nice. I'm thinking of investing in a fitting silicon protector and cutting appropriate holes myself, as there's no OEM silicon protectors.