Players defeat enemies and navigate levels by punching, kicking, and jumping.

A new playable character is unlocked after finishing a level, including Storm, Rogue, Psylocke, Nightcrawler and Iceman.

There are several foes from the X-Men universe to defeat including Callisto, Sauron, Sebastian Shaw, Omega Red, a Brood Queen and Magneto.

Each boss has their own stage based on various diverse settings from X-Men, including the Morlock Tunnels, the Savage Land, the Hellfire Club, Madripoor, the Brood homeworld and Avalon.

[4] X-Men received a highly positive review from GamePro, who commented "X-Men Game Gear squeezes all the action and graphics it can into four megs of Marvel-ous comic book mayhem.