You are right in that there are a lot of rules, but most of the rules are optional. 95% of the combat rules are optional.
Character creation, while at the beginning might take some time to get used to, you can create a full character in 10 minutes, 20 if you use the optional background charts, which garners you more (or less) building points, but fleshes out your character.
There are rules for Honor and Reputation. Those are also optional.
Yeah, lots of crunch, if you want crunch. If you dont, bare-bones it.
The only downside is the price. the PDF will be $40 , the hardback $60. But pre-order the HB in the next couple day and you can get the PDF for free.