This companion game to Kemono Friends 3 also features Friends journeying through Japari Park in an RPG adventure. When starting a game, players can choose between the standard adventure mode or a card dispensing mode. The adventure mode, like in the mobile game, is based around RPG battles. Players select two Friends, equip them with various skills, and set out to do battle with other teams of Friends. Kemono Friends 3 is a collectible card game at its core; while new players can choose to play with randomly assigned characters and skills, experienced players can draw from their deck of physical cards.
The cabinet features a card slot equipped with a camera that can scan the QR codes featured on the front of a card; players select their hand of two to five cards by scanning cards from their collection. A hand is made up of two Friend cards, two skill cards (optional), and one Nakayoshi Photo (optional). Friends are the player’s characters, always played in a team of two. Skills are special actions that Friends can use in battle; both of the scanned skills become available for both characters. Nakayoshi Photos provide special effects for a player’s entire hand; Nakayoshi Photo cards depict two Friends together, and players get an extra bonus if they’re playing a party of the two depicted Friends. First-time players, who haven’t yet had the chance to build a deck of their own, can choose one of three starter characters (Sand Cat, Silken Anteater or Bald Eagle) and will receive that card alongside their normal drop.
The player’s journey takes them on a tour of Japari Park, the setting of the Kemono Friends series. The game is divided into worlds of multiple levels. Every round, the player plays one level, with the option of either playing the next level or replaying an older level. Each level consists of one battle against a team of enemy Friends, played out in classic RPG style turn-based combat. Each turn in combat begins with a roulette wheel picking one of the two teams to go first. Each turn’s actions, both attacking and defending, plays out with short timed action minigames. Pressing the right colour button at the right time while attacking increases damage, and decreases damage while defending. Character skills also have their own special timing minigames, such as brief rhythm games. Performing well in the timing minigames charges characters’ super meters, which are unleashed when the meter is full. Using a super move requires the player to rapidly mash all three coloured buttons in a short window to charge a meter, while defending against an enemy attack requires rapidly moving the joystick to reduce the enemy’s meter. Like in most RPGs, battle ends when both characters of one team are KOed. Once the player wins, their Friends celebrate their victory the best way possible: with a high five. Players can join in by pressing the left and right buttons simultaneously as their characters high five.
At the end of each round of gameplay, players receive one physical card at random, dispensed from a slot at the base of the cabinet; these range in rarity from “R” (rare, actually the least rare) to “SSR”. The selection of cards varies over time, with cabinets having a display showing some of the higher-rarity cards they can dispense and the official website maintaining a catalogue of all cards. During special events there are also special limited cards, such as a set of Halloween cards distributed during two weeks of October. After the end of a round, players can immediately enter another coin to either progress to the next level or dispense a second card without playing another round.
Being an RPG with a long-term campaign, players are given the opportunity to save their game. Progress is saved using a player’s Aime card; tapping their Aime card onto any Kemono Friends 3 cabinet lets them continue their adventure from where they left off. Players without an Aime card can only play a single-round trial with assigned characters; they will still be granted a card at the end of their round, but they won’t be able to continue from the next level.
In the card dispensing mode, the normal gameplay is skipped and the game jumps straight to dispensing a card. Players can choose between receiving a random card, as in the normal game mode, or printing a card via a QR code. The latter lets players scan QR codes from the mobile game in order to receive physical versions of digital cards they earned on their phones; these cards can’t be used as items in the arcade mode, they’re just souvenirs of players’ favourite mobile game cards.