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Kemono Friends' 'Yōkoso Japari Park' Short Story Series Debuts on August 12
posted on by Jennifer Sherman
The official website for TV Tokyo's AniTele app revealed on Wednesday that it will begin streaming the first two episodes of the "Yōkoso Japari Park" "original short story" on August 12 at 4:00 p.m. The first episode will be available to users with free memberships. The story will be set in the world of Nexon's original Kemono Friends app game, which launched in March 2015 and ended service in December 2016.
AniTele's booth at the Comic Market 94 event will give away an "AniTele Otakara DVD" (AniTele Treasure DVD) that will feature the first episode of the work. The booth will offer a total of 10,000 of the DVDs at various distribution times during the event, which will be held at the Tokyo Big Sight complex from August 10-12.
In the story, the Friends and head of Japari Park work to overcome a big crisis in the lead-up to the opening of the park. Park guide Mirai and Serval make a video record of the situation. The work's title is similar to "Yōkoso Japari Park e" (Welcome to Japari Park), the title of the opening theme song of the 2017 Kemono Friends television anime series.
The following voice actors are returning from the television anime: Aya Uchida as Lucky Beast and Mirai, Ai Nonaka as Serval, and Yuka Ozaki (Serval in the anime) for narration.
Haruki Kasugamori (Keroro) is directing and writing the script for the project, and he is also in charge of animation, photography, and editing. Ryūtarō Kanamochi is in charge of series composition and the script. Mine Yoshizaki provided the conceptual design for the franchise, and Frontier Creator's Project produced the scenario for the original game. Makio Kurita is the scenario producer. Nobuyuki Abe is returning as sound director, and Akiyuki Tateyama (Laid-Back Camp, ISLAND) and Kyōhei Matsuno (You Don't Know Gunma Yet, Lunatan: 1-Mannen no Himitsu) are composing the music. Nobuyuki Hosoya (One Punch Man, Aikatsu!), Hitoshi Kajii, and Eiji Katō are producers.
TV Tokyo revealed in March 2017 that AniTele would offer exclusive "original content" for the Kemono Friends anime. The service launched in April 2017.
A second anime season is planned. However, the first season's director TATSUKI and anime studio Yaoyorozu will not be involved in the project. The first 12-episode television anime (pictured right) premiered on TV Tokyo and TV Osaka on in January 2017. Crunchyroll streamed the series as it aired.
The franchise has also inspired other smartphone apps and several stage plays.
Sources: The Mainichi Shimbun's Mantan Web, MoCa News, Comic Natalie
