Inversion is a third-person shooter set in the near future and the fictional Vanguard City. Players control the cop Davis Russel when the city is invaded by an unknown enemy called the Lutadore and his daughter Leila is kidnapped. The game starts at the end of the story, when he is captured and about to be executed, and the preceding events are then played as separate episodes in a flashback, leading up to the final moment. The game starts at the beginning of the invasion when Russel patrols the city and the first sightings are called in.

Much of the game is played like a classic third-person shooter with different weapons, cover-based movement, and different teams of AI-controlled allies that provide assistance but cannot be controlled directly. The game's distinct feature is the manipulation of gravity. The Lutadore have mastered this technology and early on the game Russel also gets access to it. The gravlink device is worn as a backpack and allows him to manipulate gravity to his advantage. It is used to lift obstacles, objects and opponents, and to grab objects and hurl them at the enemy. The technology can also be used to lift opponents from their covered position. Later in the game the gravlink becomes stronger and it can be used to pin enemies to the ground or to lift objects to construct a makeshift cover position. The manipulation of objects is not done entirely freely, as it applies only to some items and not all of the environment can be transformed.

The same limitations apply when the entire environment's gravity is shifted. At specific points the Lutadore alter gravity, rotating it 90 degrees. That way Russel suddenly fights from the side of the building he was just passing by. At other points gravity can also be reversed 180 degrees. He also encounters zero gravity zones where he is able to float with a boost to move forward. As many other objects also float in the air, the same cover-based tactics can be used with backflips and boosts to move between parts of the environment and shoot opponents from the air.

Multiplayer includes a four-player cooperative mode called Survival. It is a separate campaign with a set of maps where players need to work together against computer-controlled opponents and progress against a time limit. Time is extended by completing the events before it runs out. A competitive multiplayer game mode is Hourglass, where objectives need to be captured and held to swing a meter in your team's favour. At certain points during the game, gravity is flipped 180 degrees and the game continues on the ceiling. Next to Death Match there is Gravity Slaughter, which is similar, but more points are earned by defeating players using the gravlink; throwing objects at them or using finishers. The final mode is King of Gravity. It is a King of the Hill mode with a single gravlink per game. The player who holds it becomes very powerful and the other players need to work together to kill him. Once another player picks it up , he becomes the new target and must hold on to it as long as possible.