If you're looking for a great sci-fi simulator, then look no further, because this one has all that makes a great game.
Gameplay just amusing, although hard at first to take off from the different kinds of station, you'll have a hang of it pretty quick, but I guarantee that you won't become a master just because you didn't crashed your spaceship the first few times. You start of with a simple ship and you need to trade (and a lot) of merchandise between planets like food supplies, water, and the like, but you can also trade illegal goods such as Nerve Gas, and you can get cought by the police, but you'll gain more money from it. In the middle you'll encounter space pirates, and the first ones are easy to take them, but as you progress in the game, they'll get tougher, so just because you got a 10MW Beam Laser and a lot of shields in a good ship, doesn't make you the best out there, because you can STILL get killed with one good whip against a pirate with a Plasma Beam, so save a LOT to prevent backtracking.
In the start of the game you'll most likely be trading from a place to another, in order to obtain the most money possible, so you can buy a better and bigger ship, better equipment and also, better offensive/defensive gear, like lasers and shields, and by the time you'll get the best ship in the game and the best stuff also, you'll be exploring and killing pirates instead of trading.
As you kill pirates, you'll gain promotions, and as soon as you reach a certain point of it, you'll gain money from pirates, and also, keep an eye on the journals and bulletin boards (only when you're in a station), they sometimes have useful information of certain quests that are available, like escort, assassination and some special quests. For what? I won't tell you ;) That would ruin the fun of the game, since this game also has a storyline (kinda).
If you can get your hands on this game and are able to play it, do so, because it'll be so much worth it.