I won't be lying, this is not a game for everyone. It is weird. Controls are weird. Story is kinda missing. It feels like an unfinished project. Partly, because it is (check its history, there are a few good articles on that).
For someone like me, with a decent knack for space exploration, learning mechanics, getting in trouble and getting out of it - it's worth checking out.
Playing this.. feels like flying huge, slow, decently-multifunctional large space ship. Wanna shoot pirate fighters? Hah, just forget it. You won't turn fast enough, not mentioning your main gun array shoots bolts spaced so apart that fighters will simply fly between shots. Send some pilots in fighters after them. Want to land on a planet? Lol. With a huge warp-capable spaceship? Forget it. You'll just crash. Send shuttle, tanks, mining drone/etc. Why mine? to mine materials needed for repair, because you won't find magic health packs lying around the galaxy. Bored sitting in the deck? You can pilot that figher or shuttle yourself, and yeah, get killed, permadeath, no free respawns, Commander. Just joking, there are saves and you can load anytime. If I recall well, that is. It's been years.
I love(d) that game, but it's a weird game. It has some bugs. It has some huge gaps, like, drop on a planet, find enemy base, raze it, survive, and ... nothing. But somehow doing things against all odds left me with this crazy inner feeling of an achievement. Learning how to control things takes time. Learning what things really mean takes time. Learning not to do stupid things. Yeah, landing and razing an enemy base on a planet might be boring after tenth time, just like observing what your mining drone found on that moon, it gets boring. But succeeding in doing this or that for the first time after so many failures.. :]