The goal is to change all of the tiles on a pyramid to the target color. To do this you guide Q*bert around the pyramid and every
tile he hops on will change color. On early levels, a single hop will change the tile to the desired color but on later levels, you may need to hop on a tile multiple times or even avoid hopping on a tile multiple times! Trying to stop Q*bert are many different creatures which wander around the board including Coily the snake - Slick and Sam and falling balls. On the edge of the board are floating discs. If Q*bert jumps on one of these discs when the snake is in pursuit the snake will fall off the board while Q*bert is safely transported to the top.