You're a team of lowly maintenance robots built to keep the space station operational and clean so that the colonists can get on with...whatever it is they do. Unfortunately, the station has been invaded by creeps, alien creatures that slowly advance toward food (the colonists) so that they can multiply. The only thing keeping the colonists from being completely wiped out is your knowledge of the station, a couple of specialty tools and abilities unique to each of you, and a little bit of problem-solving code installed so you could do your jobs efficiently.

Jupiter Rescue is a co-operative strategy game in which players work together to escort 28 colonists to an escape pod before they're converted into alien creeps. Each turn, players may take five actions, choosing from common options — moving themselves, moving nearby colonists, or killing alien creeps — and a series of programming cards that grant them special abilities. These cards can be played on the player's turn to activate the ability. Each player also gets to choose one card to be his "core" ability, letting him use it every turn instead of discarding it.

New creeps are added to the board, which is composed of tiles, at the end of each player's turn by rolling a die; if a tile fills up with creeps, it's destroyed and removed from the game. Players lose if enough colonists get turned into creeps, or if certain key board tiles are all destroyed. Double-sided tiles allow for hundreds of station variations.