Game Informer's preview gives a better idea of how it plays
Players venture out for improved weapons, scanners, space suits, and ships. While there are no specific classes, adventurers can tailor their skills to a specific playstyle or blend in a bit of everything. If you're mostly interested in combat, you can shoot down pirates and other known villain factions to earn money and invest in fighter ships with more defense and firepower. Players who want to branch out and discover new worlds should buy science craft with longer hyperdrive range and speed, and suits that allow exploration in toxic atmospheres or longer underwater time. Space truckers should invest in bulky cargo ships so they can haul tons of planetside resources to trading posts and spaceports.
- There is a story, but they aren't talking about it right now
- Apparently the main goal it to make it to the center of the galaxy
- There will be a punishment for death. If you're fighting creatures on a planet and end up dying then you'll restart on your ship but lose everything since you've last checked in. If your ship blows up then you'll lose everything that it was carrying at the time.
- Ships are procedurally generated. They say that sites could start to popup to map out exactly which ships are at which spacestation and which stats they have. They say that there are some really common ships and others that are extremely rare.