Shinobi Legions (新忍伝 (Shin Shinobi Den) in Japan) is a side-scrolling action game, similar to Shinobi III. Sho's primary weapons are a sword and a finite number of shurikens, both of which are activated with separate buttons. Sho can learn nearly a dozen sword abilities (spinning slash, downward slash, sword shielding, etc.) by collecting powerups scattered throughout the stages. There are also the "Fire Dragon" powerups that act as single use ninja magic attacks that damage all enemies on-screen, which is the only ninja magic available to Sho.

zoboner, using an input sequence to play on the hardest difficulty, clears the game in record time.