Clumsy controls and poor HUD make this game harder to play than it should be...
In-game option only have volume levels and key assignments. It seems there's no way to configure your game pad buttons from here - only the analog sensitivity. Having the roll action on 'A' and 'D' keys is weird and strafing in-game is useless. Sound is so-so. Not bad but not great.
Playing a mission brings to cabin where you'll be briefed about the mission. Next is the hangar where you can change your load-out from your ship's hull, armor, engine to your weapons and add-on equipment. You can also create your own armors and weapons (which is a feature of this game).
The visuals are good enough but not spectacular. Depending on the light source, the ship will be mostly black or at least dark. The game's screen interface is a bit bloated with useless info. The HUD covers almost 2/5 of the screen. Some numbers are hard to read because of the color and size. Targeting a ship gives you its hull, armor and shield left, the distance and velocity. Your ally's distance and velocity info (colored white) is easier to read than your enemy's (having red color on usually black background). The games dialogue subtitles are hard to read too if you're moving towards a bright planet or star. The most frustrating thing is the change camera. Changing your view has an almost 1 second fade out to black and fade in transition. Why did they put it there?
The controls are a bit problematic. Most of the time you'll be reorienting your mouse when targeting because you can only follow the target when constantly moving your mouse, unlike in some other games where your ship's direction is dependent on how far the pointer is from the center of the screen.
Depending on your playing style, by changing you ship's temperature you can be in Shadow Mode where your ship's speed, attack speed and damage is lowered but gains stealth capability; Corter Mode where you can deal more damage and fire faster but constantly lowers of shield and maximum energy; and Standard Mode where there's no bonus or penalty whatsoever. You can also command your wingmen by selecting your target and using the shortcut keys listed on the screen. But most of the time you can leave them on their own.
In my first few hours of playing this, I died a lot of times. A lot. You should just be mindful of your temperature. Most of the time I get rammed or collide with the enemy's ship which result in big damage (on my part). Too bad there's no "match target speed" option and no autopilot of any kind.
Overall the game is a good deal. Quirky controls aside, with 22 mission, this game can keep you busy for 10 to 15 hours depending on how good you are. If you're an avid space shooter fan, you would definitely get this.