Space Harrier is a fast-paced rail shooter game played in a third-person perspective behind the protagonist, set in a surreal world composed of brightly coloured landscapes adorned with checkerboard-style grounds and stationary objects such as trees or stone pillars.

The objective is simply to destroy all enemies—who range from prehistoric animals and Chinese dragons to flying robots, airborne geometric objects and alien pods—all while remaining in constant motion in order to dodge projectiles and immovable ground obstacles.