At the start of the game, the player must choose between three different difficulty options:
Easy (which features eight cards and starts at 5000 points)
Medium (which features twelve cards and starts at 9000 points)
Hard (which features twenty-four cards and starts at 12000 points)
Each difficulty is represented by a different character at the bottom-right corner: Yoshi appears in Easy mode, Mario appears in Medium, and Princess Peach appears in Hard.
Once the player selects a difficulty, the game begins. The player then has to match up every card as quickly as possible. By matching a pair, a sound effect corresponding to the card's subject plays, most of which were recycled from Super Mario 3D World. The score which deducts 100 points to the time bonus for every second elapsed. Each match is worth 500 points. Once the player matches every card, they receive a final score; they can also click the "What's THAT?" button to read a short description of each character and item featured on the cards during the game.
The music that plays throughout the game is the overworld theme from Super Mario Bros.