I'm sorry to hear that you had trouble with the keybinds.
- If you press Spacebar, then if you're being prompted to dodge, then the dodging marker stops moving.
- If you press Q or Z, and if you're in Spaceship form #1, then the Jammer is activated and the HUD shows its status is 0. Missiles that are affected rotate and fly upward.
- If you press W or X, and if you're in Spaceship forms #1 or #2, then the Countermeasures are activated and the HUD shows its status is 0. Missiles that are affected rotate in-place and explode.
- If you press 1, 2, or 3, then the game attempts to transform your ship into another form. The center part of the HUD shows the transformation happening, and then the left part of the HUD shows your new selection. Of course, if you select the same ship that you already have, then nothing happens.
- If you press P or ESC, you pause the game.
- If you press Enter, P, or ESC, you dismiss any tip or pause message and unpause the game.
Did you try the tutorial? I tried to make the mechanics clear there with a fairly detailed walkthrough. There is only one known mistake in the tutorial, where it says that Z is the alternative key for Countermeasures, when it should say X is the alternative.
If all of this has failed, do you have a non-QWERTY keyboard layout by any chance?