Okay, I'm in Chapter 3 now after putting in about 5 hours into the game. I understand the game a lot more now so I can give proper impressions. Not sure if anyone really cares judging from the responses (or lack thereof) in the thread so far but I'll give it a shot anyway.
I can say for sure that anyone expecting a "RPG" from this game will be disappointed and I honestly hope Sega will promote it as something else when it is released in the US. Adventure or Simulation would definitely be more fitting. That said, it's a really good game!
It's best to think of the game as a visual novel adventure for all the story sequences (which means sometimes there is an event still, and most of the time you're looking at the portrait of a character talking with a background still in the background, and sometimes you'll get to pick decisions) while the rest of the game is a space simulation.
You need design plans before you can build a ship or install a module, and you find these plans either through the story, a sidequest, or buying them from planets which have industrial offices that sell plans. You can only build/customize your ships on planets which have a orbital factories, so you can't do it on every planet.
You recruit crew members through the storyline as well as through sidequests and optional events. They are all named characters and have their own personalities and substories. Think of it as Suikoden, but in space. Characters have stats and stuff which will help you determine where to best place them on your fleet. There's a huge amount of roles you can assign characters to in the game, but it's not really overly complicated - but rather something that gives you the feel that everyone can have a responsibility on the crew. As long as a character is equipped as a crew member, they will gain exp in battles and level up. I like to think of the ships as the characters (in a normal RPG), and the crew members and modules as accessories/equipment you equip.
Battles are rather simple but effective, and simple doesn't mean they're easy either, just that you don't have a gazillion options to play around with and tactics can be obvious but timing is still important. You have an ATB bar that builds up and it has 3 levels: Green, Yellow, Red. There is also a side-view panel showing the distance between your fleet and the enemy fleet, as well as your attacking range. You can set your fleet to either be moving forward, backward or standing still at any time during the battle it doesn't cost anything.
When the ATB's green bar fills up, you can empty it to put your fleet on evasive mode, this will last until you make your next command. When in evasive mode, if the enemy uses "Fire all cannons" on any of your ships, you'll evade it, but it doesn't do jack shit for regular attacks. When your bar turns yellow, you'll be able to do a regular attack which fires a single volley of all weapons. If you let your bar turn red, you can drain it all for a "Fire all cannons" attack which fires 3 volleys of all your weapons. But remember, while this is effective, it can also be evaded by the enemy if they are able to.
There are other options which open up in battle later on in terms of special commands characters can make (think Valkyria's Orders) or you can even do boarding attacks which are rock-paper-scissors-ish. Mostly the battles create a very good feel of simulating space battles, without making them too complicated. It could be more complex and more strategic, but I don't think there's anything particularly wrong with how they are in the game. Especially since there are random encounters when you travel between worlds, making it simple might actually be better in the long run.
Outside of customization and battles, the gameplay also revolves around the star map. The star maps are basically like a menu driven World Map system, except while travelling between planets you can get into random encounters. The game has no "dungeons" or anything to speak of, instead each chapter in the game involves your fleet getting involved in some incident in the star system you're in, and you travel from world to world talking to people and you'll get missions to travel to different places to get information and/or find something/someone. Aside from random battles there are also story battles, etc.
As the story grows, you begin to encounter more people and learn more and more about the large and detailed worldview crafted for the game. It's a lot like Mass Effect in that sense, where it's an epic space opera adventure, and you get more and more involved and the history and scope of the universe grows larger. The difference here is, since you're the captain of a spaceship, as your crew grows larger and your fleet of ships grow in both size of fleet and size of the actual ships, you definitely get a good sense of being more involved in the events of the universe and growing in both fame and responsiblity.
Basically, everyone who loves space stuff should DEFINITELY check out this game when it's out in English.
