Both.  Rules are written from a hex perspective but mention is made on how to play without hexes.

Eeek! There is a painful (on the eye!) issue with all the L's in the PDF. Looks like they have been replaced with bold | marks.

It goes away when the file is printed -- but for some reason the page layout software used does some funky things when the PDF is viewed on the screen.

We are working to fix the problem, and you will receive an updated file once it is fixed.

(And we won't be using that software anymore, right Todd? )

Neat! My stuff suffered a bit from being partially built with pre-revision construction, but glad to see it finally out.

(Then again, it may work anyway, if you can think they may not have the same multiplicity of sophistication that a full-on government).

You dig giant robots/
I dig giant robots/
Chicks dig giant robots.

Thanks for the quick update -- looks much better!

I won't comment on the demo rules, but I'll try to answer the second half of the question.

Movement is pretty similar to some of the other games out there.  I have to admit, there's only so much variation that can be made on that front.

Combat and damage are where the major differences are.  You lock your target(s) up first then anything you have in range and arc can fired at it.  Destroying the unit doesn't require you to strip away armor points or such. Your shot has one of three results. Nothing (this can be a miss or deflection), damages the armor but doesn't penetrate, or it punches a hole in the armor and messes up something inside the target...possibly destroying it.  This means infantry with a good heavy weapon can make even an assault unit pilot break into a cold sweat.  I tried to approach the whole system from a real world effect perspective as much as possible...and yet keep it fun, playable, and customizable.  As a result...movement and tactics play a major role in victory...

Then there is the design system.  Much like Starmada, it gives you a level of flexibility in building your units and weapons that few, if any, other games have.  And as stated, by altering the tech level you can play steampunk era...having ponderous walkers with 16# cannon or more modern WWII era style units...or the futuristic stuff which is where most mecha games tend to exist at.

And of course being able to tie into Starmada for doing multi-planetary campaigning is a big bonus in my opinion. 

Hope this helps.

I did art for it ! Yeah!

Ian!