from what i can see from the demo (its 90 mins limited, but enough to do a few story missions), its more "similar" to freelancer then to the X-Series.
-there are no "gate-highways" as in freelancer... just gates between the big systems like in X.
-the main movement is frog-leap-jumpdriveing around the map... depending on the jump drive (better= higher jump range) it can take several jumps to get from planet to planet or to whereever you want to go.
think the jump button in the main screen seem to be some emergency jump forward... where the "frogleap" is the "launch" button in the nav screen after picking a target in range of the jump drive (range listed down left in the nav screen)
-there are battleships and large transports and cruisers and carriers flying around... but i think you cant own/fly them. think carriers are more mobile tradeing stations in the war zones to repair and buy weapons etc... (but not realy possible to get to a war zone in the demo... think the faction all teh way north is the evil alien one at war or so... and you start quite far away from it)
-the player ship seems to be just a "fighter", but you can configure the design a bit. there are like 20 cockpits with different stats and like 20 different wings. soem give more "space" to equip better engines or so and others more speed or more agility or armor...
also like 10 different "armor levels", 5 different cargo levels, 10 different engine levels, 10 different shield levels...
from all that you can pick one each and throw that on your ship... and then adjust a bit where it is placed on it (i.e. high wings like a transport plane.. or low wings like a fighter... or mroe forward or more backwards.)
-i think you can hire other ships as "wingmans" and order them around a bit (mine asteroids, guard, attack), i think you cant realy own an "empire" like in X with 100+ stations, 20+ capital ships 300+ fighters...
-think the buildable stations are more used to "upgrade" the stuff thats sold in trade stations and not (how to say it...) "on their own like in X"... i.e. you build a research station and the sold weapons are higher levels. but its not like you can realy build in the 90 demo mins...
well just my impressions of it of like 40-60 mins the demo... someone who owns teh game and played it longer probably know better what buildable stations do or if you can own 100+ fighters... (atleast the web sais "fleet command system", not "hire 5 wingmans", but with "fleet" it might just be meant the ships you hire. (and not realy owning tons of ships as in X))
(personally i am still more looking forward to X-rebirth than buying this "light similar" evochron... but people who liked freelancer should try out the demo atleast and see themself... atleast it has a demo)