The game is set on a grand strategic level with each player controlling a civilization. There are six civs supplied, all with the same basic units and each culture haves "secret weapons" which give the ships some differences.
The starships come in various classes which are similar to the various naval ship classifications but on a much larger scale.
The turns consist of 14 phases covering the movement and combat for non-mobile unit, major mobile units and minor mobile units. There is also an Industrial inter-phase every third turn which is used to adjust the amount of resources available to each player.
The rules contain many special cases and details but with no index looking up any specific clause is difficult.
Expansion: