The European Mega Drive version later gained renewed popularity due to the "All your base are belong to us" internet meme, which plays off the badly translated introductory cutscene.

Zero Wing is a science fiction-themed side-scrolling shooter similar to Hellfire, where players assume the role of Trent taking control of the ZIG space fighter craft through eight increasingly difficult levels, each with a boss at the end that must be fought before progressing any further, in a last-ditch effort to overthrow the alien cyborg CATS as the main objective.

[4][5][6][7][8] As far as side-scrolling shooters go, the title initially appears to be very standard, as players control their craft over a constantly scrolling background and the scenery never stops moving until the stage boss is reached.

There are three types of weapons in the game that can be switched between after destroying incoming carriers by picking up a color-changing item ranging from the "Red Cannon" shot, the "Blue Laser" and the "Green Homing" missiles.

[7] Getting hit by enemy fire or colliding against solid stage obstacles will result in losing a life, as well as a penalty of decreasing the ship's firepower and speed to his original state and once all lives are lost, the game is over unless the players insert more credits into the arcade machine to continue playing.

Set in 2101, the game follows the signing of a peace treaty between the United Nations (also translated as the Milky Way Federation) and CATS, a space pirate organization.

[9][10][11][12] Artists Miho Hayashi, Naoki Ogiwara and Shintarō Nakaoka created the artwork while Sanae Nitō and Yuko Tataka served as character designers.

[9][14][15][16][17][18] However, Uemura felt that both stage design and characters were "cobbled together", leading the game's world being "kind of a mess" and he also stated the project turned into a "battle royale", as staff from both Hellfire and Truxton were mixed with the new recruits.

[9][11][12][15] Due to being a training project, Uemura stated the team had freedom to "just fool around" and several features were integrated into the title such as warps, which was taken from Slap Fight.

[15] Uemura also revealed that the reason for enemies spawning suicide bullets during loops of higher difficulty was in response to hardware limitations regarding sprites.

The Steam release will include a "range of quality-of-life enhancements, such as stunning pixel-perfect graphics, rewind, achievements, online leaderboards, sidebar indicators, and a brand new Very Easy mode".

[29] In Japan, Game Machine listed Zero Wing on their 15 November 1989 issue as being the fourth most-successful table arcade unit of the month, outperforming titles such as Jitsuryoku!!

They praised "the great intro sequence", "super-smooth gameplay, beautifully defined graphics, rocking sound track, amazing explosions and incredible end-of-level bosses", concluding that it is "the game which breaths (sic) new life into shoot 'em ups on the Megadrive".

They praised the "ace" opening sequence, "detailed" graphics, "real good" music, and skill-based gameplay, concluding that it is one of "the best Megadrive blasts in ages.

They praised the "animated intro" sequence, "smart" graphics, "up-beat Jap tune" music, and the accessible but "highly involved" gameplay, concluding that it is "almost as good as Hellfire" but "not quite.

[66]: 250  In 1999, the introduction cutscene for the Sega Mega Drive version of Zero Wing was re-discovered, culminating in the wildly popular "All your base are belong to us" Internet meme.