At least one neighbor must be saved from each level to progress to the next. If the player does not find a neighbor fast enough, an enemy will kill them when touched, preventing them from being saved for the remainder of the game or until an 'Extra Bonus Victim' is awarded. In each of the 55 stages, which includes seven optional bonus levels, the goal is to rescue the surviving neighbors by touching them, at which point a door opens that will take the player to the next stage. They navigate suburban neighborhoods, shopping malls, pyramids, haunted castles and other areas, destroying a variety of horror-movie monsters, including vampires, werewolves, huge demonic babies, squidmen, evil dolls, aliens, UFOs, giant ants, blobs, giant worms, and the game's namesake, zombies.

The player chooses between two characters, Zeke and Julie, or both in a two-player mode. In 2009, Zombies Ate My Neighbors was re-released for the Virtual Console to positive reviews. It spawned a sequel, Ghoul Patrol, released in 1994. While not a massive commercial success, the game has been well received for its graphical style, humor and deep gameplay. Various elements and aspects of horror movies are referenced in the game with some of its more violent content being censored in various territories such as Europe and Australia, where it is known only as Zombies. Aiding them in this task are a variety of weapons and power-ups that can be used to battle the numerous enemies in each level. One or two players take control of protagonists Zeke and Julie in order to rescue the titular neighbors from monsters often seen in horror movies. Zombies Ate My Neighbors is a run and gun video game developed by LucasArts and originally published by Konami for the Super Nintendo and Sega Mega Drive/Sega Genesis consoles in 1993.

Zombies ate my neighbors level codes