Well firstly, it's *she* but I get that a lot
I use this handle specifically because I don't typically specify in some of my less active forum posts elsewhere in the internet (especially places where it makes a difference >.< )
I'm not saying it's entirely skill based, Just more so than most games, thus why the plethora of skills and available skill checks. Even piloting a SAMAS in combat requires skill checks. And Combat driving, and sniping and....you get my drift. There are actually about a dozen skills that are actually used as part of combat. So skills can overlap within combat it's not always one or the other.
However, I find that with all the skills out there, the game system lends itself better to a "more than just combat" style game. Gods forbid you have a techno wiz added in...then you get math, formulae and all kinds of fun throwin'-crap-together, which can be a minigame in and of itself.
And then there's rules for creating AIs if you really want to go there. (One day....)
I find Rifts works better as a "go break into X experimental lab, steal the plans and eliminate opposition however you see fit." game rather than a game of random encounters. Even as a DB you can bluff/stealth/bribe/intimidate/scam your way past the CS... I guess the fluff reflects the crunch. You can do almost anything within it, and while combat does have set skills, you have more ways to avoid combat than pretty much any other game I've ever played.
Bad guys in the guard room? Do you:
a) forge fake papers and pretend to be an official?
b)engage the security defenses from a nearby panel and gas them?
c)set off alarms in another part of the complex, forcing them to run off to take care of it?
d)sneak past them?
e)send in something to grab what you need and pop back out?
f)brew up a chemical agent and toss it in?
g)blow up the room?
h)cause the floor/ceiling to collapse?
etc etc.
Yes there are a lot of guns (there are more skills).
There's also a ton of vehicles, cybernetics, medical devices, generic equipment (at least five different types of personal computers, and I think nine or so different types of radios), it's a very rich diverse world with engaging lively trade consortiums and civilizations at various states of development. That doesn't mean it's all about combat any more than having a crapton of vehicles means it's all about racing, or having a listing for medical devices at various stages (including bio enhancements) means it's a medical game.
Combat is pivotal, but in Rifts, unlike so many others, it doesn't have to be. It can be just a vehicle to get to the plot points, and in fact I've been in campaigns where it is. Shooting bad guys was just to get the info/contact/access to the tech needed to further the story. I think that one we ended up running our own company by the end of it, stocked up on one of the nicer levels of Phase World.
No, I'm not saying it doesn't have combat, or even that it utterly minimizes it, or that it's *all* about skills, but skills in Rifts can be as or more important than how many times you shoot/stab/blast things.
I've seen completely combat centered characters in Rifts games...about two thirds of the campaign they were off scene twiddling their thumbs. A skillful character with next to no combat viability is much more useful in rifts than a combat centered character with no skill viability*.
(*again dependent on who's running, but I do maintain that rifts runs better with a heavier focus on skills than combat-not no combat, just less than skill use)