One of the key reasons for having a lot of literal forms is because REBOL was designed as a messaging language. You can think of it as a data format as much as anything. Template literals in ES6 help with DSL support, which is fundamental in Red's design. It doesn't mean you can just include anything in Red, but the wide array of native forms lets you build a lot of embedded DSLs without resorting to string parsing. Being able to parse at the block level (i.e. datatype level) is really nice.
A couple other new features make dealing with non-loadable input easier too. You can use macros to pre-process data, trap errors that `load` triggers and still get back a block of values, or spec some simple rules in `system/lexer/pre-load`. That's another way we might deal with IPv6 values.
Yes, a message format. What I would add is, that today ppl are using JSON, not realising, that it is de-facto a Rebol, or at least strongly inspired by Rebol. Well - who wants to use cryptic formats anyway, right? :-)
A couple other new features make dealing with non-loadable input easier too. You can use macros to pre-process data, trap errors that `load` triggers and still get back a block of values, or spec some simple rules in `system/lexer/pre-load`. That's another way we might deal with IPv6 values.