The game was praised for its graphics and its soundtrack performed by Tommy Tallarico, although the film footage was considered low quality.

The Terminator is tasked with killing Sarah, preventing her future son John Connor from leading the human resistance against Skynet.

[5] The graphics and music took advantage of the Sega CD's capabilities, and the game includes the use of digitized full motion video (FMV) from the film.

[6] The soundtrack was composed and recorded by Tommy Tallarico, with additional songs contributed by Brad Fiedel ("The Terminator Theme"), Bijan Shaheer ("Future Shock"), Joey Kuras ("Visions") and TeknoMan of Teknologic ("CyberTek").

[22][23][19][20] Paul Pettengale of Sega Power wrote, "The images are so grainy, and the colours so fuzzy, looking too hard at these bits could be bad for your eyes".

[22] Paul Mellerick of Mega was disappointed by the linear level design and concluded, "A well-presented blast, but ultimately boring, very samey and a bit of a waste".

[16] In a later review for AllGame, Shawn Sackenheim praised the "bleak" and "dreary" graphics, stating that they "lend themselves nicely to the mood of the game".