The game is a fast-moving, first-person combat flight simulator, rendered with colourful wireframe vector graphics inspired by San's love of the 1983 Atari coin-op Star Wars.

The game takes over the surface of the occupied planet Novenia, and it is the player's goal to rid the world of the mechanised Egron invaders.

Starglider was packaged with a sci-fi novella by James Follett, describing the game's background story, in which the Egrons effortlessly blitz Novenia despite the planet possessing a previously impenetrable network of utterly deadly defense satellites.

called it "a visually smooth concoction that is so realistic in its feel that you'll duck and squirm in your seat", especially praising the Atari ST version's graphics and sound.

[6] A prototype version of Starglider, codenamed NESGlider,[7] was developed for the Nintendo Entertainment System utilizing a similar method to accelerate graphics as the future Super FX chip for the SNES would.