I believe this game is somewhat of a Egosoft's attempt to bring something fresh to a franchise. While it is obviously not a stellar sucess, it makes many steps in right direction, but unfortunately also makes some very bad ones and especially so in regards to its predecessors, which is it's single greatest sin. It is now tweaked and patched and a lot better than it was, but it still remains what I consider an important, milestone, but yet not really sucessful experiment.
The bad: buggy, tedious, interface-ally confusing and frustrating, AI is sometimes downright ridiculous (autopilot, NPC navigation). It can be very repetitive on many different levels. Trading is not what it should be in essence, yet there are two paralel trading systems (cargo and personal)?? Many station and NPCs are feeling very generic. Mini games are repetitive and boring. Various aspects of game are not balanced, etc, etc..
The good: feeling of presence in the universe is fantastic. Graphically it's very good. Ship finally have believable cockpit; entering and looking around the ship now looks like you are really there (instruments, copilot, sounds) Stations are gigantic and are teeming with life and traffic. Ships are more detailed than ever. Boarding mechanics feels there is always a prize in carefully planning battles with capital ships. There are rare and hidden missions and items to find.
Conclusion: I did very much enjoy Rebirth in the end. If in next X game developer keeps all mentioned good things, but instead of many dubious experimental stuff which was not received well at all put instead more effort in variety and content (more story, plots, missions, situation templates, ships and ways and paths to upgrade them, not mentioning different NPCs, their faces and roles, and interaction with them), than maybe Rebirth could be observed as a birth of something more than a hit and miss experiment it is viewed as now.
