Good at what it does
SPAZ is a fun little game. The preview/demo can be frustrating because you are on rails through most of it, but after you get past the first hour of gameplay the galaxy opens up a little bit. Whether you like the next hour or two of gameplay will really decide whether you like the game or not.
You control a ship, fly around, and shoot things. This game is really something of a cross between an RPG and a space shooter, because your research is gained much the same way experience is (by blowing things up). And with the RPG mechanics come the standard problems of RPGs: grinding for XP and money. The difficulty of the game has issues too, mainly in the center systems, where even in the largest (and most finely granulated) galaxy, the central systems can be 10 levels of research apart, necessitating griding.
That said, if you like flying around in your ship and blowing stuff up, there's a lot of that. The quests provide things to do and ways to improve your relations with one faction or the other in each system. There's plenty of options and I do think it is a good game.
The biggest fault of the game is that it has fairly narrow content (although that content is very deep). You fly around and blow up ships, and you get to tweak and design your small fleet as you see fit. Combat can get repetitive at times, although the variety of weapons lets you liven things up. I enjoy playing heavily shielded ships with high speed engines, light armor (less mass so you can go faster), mass bombs, and beams for taking down shields. I chose to neglect my hulls and armor because I wasn't using them. If those kinds of decisions appeal to you, then this game is fun. If not, there's not much else here for you: no shipping, no trading goods, no crafting, and the story is adequate but not standout.
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