So when I first started playing, I thought I would immediately fall in love with this game. On paper, it has everything I like: spaceships, grand strategy, logistics/city/factory building, etc. But after perhaps 100 hours the game just feels ok. I guess the problem is there is no real obstacle or sense of achievement. After the slow grind in early game, you finally earned you first heavy fighter, freighter, or a factory, and...the game is over in some sense. You might want to build a trade empire by building mega complexes and swarm the market with your goods, and nothing is stopping you from doing that, literally. The universe doesn't react to you much, and you don't have to react to the universe. No in-game corporations is trying to tear down you new business. You don't have to adjust your plans or devise new strategies at any moment. And the money you earned is just for another complex. I never feel like I actually achieved anything. Also, the jumpdrive makes logistics very simple and uninteresting since you don't have to plan trade routes. (I heard LU mod is good for economic games but unfortunately I don't have the time to try it yet) The combat aspect suffers a similar problem. You can buy and fly ships, from fighters to huge capital ships, and they are somewhat fun to fly, but they don't have much purpose. You can roleplay as mercenary/commander of a faction and wage war against another faction, or fight evil AI or aliens, but without mods, the universe don't care about your actions. Stations you destroyed gets rebuilt and enemy fleet respawns. But at least, there are mods to fix this (such as Improved Races). It's unfortunate, but I cannot recommend this game to people who enjoy grand strategy game, spacesims, citybuilers, or factory games. It has elements of all but feels hollow.
As a Star Wars RTS, this game is very disappointing. The gameplay is simply way too similar to Age of Empires II. Sure, it's based on the AoE II engine, so it's understandable that the some of the gameplay elements will be similar. However, the developers didn't really make much change in terms of gameplay, so 90% of the gameplay mechanism is identical to AoE II, and it just doesn't fit into the Star Wars setting. Farming, hunting animals, fishing, chopping down forests, knocking down buildings with a ram, etc, breaks all the immersions. What makes things worst, all the factions are functionally nearly identical, with some minor tweaks here and there. This is ok in AoE II, but definitely not in a Star Wars RTS. The only major difference between AoE II and this game is the addition of air units, but honestly it doesn't feel like it change the gamplay much. There aren't much depth in air combat (but this is kinda understandable as a game based on AoE II engine). The aircrafts, as you might expected, works like helicopters, so don't expect so see some epic dogfights between a TIE and a X-Wing. One thing I will praise, though, is some of the combat oriented campaign missions, as they actually feel like something out of Star Wars, where armies armed with blasters clashes with each other in massive battles while jedi and sith duel to the death. I will give this game 4/5 if this was a massive overhaul mod made by fan gamers, but as a professional product made by a professional gaming studio, I will say it's very mediocre and uninspiring. If you are here for the Star Wars part, you will be disappointed. If you're here for the RTS part, you might as well just play AoE II.
