Once you have inserted one coin into the cabinet of Namco's Japan-only 1996 soccer arcade game J-League Soccer Prime Goal EX and pressed either Start Button, you'll have twenty seconds to select one of the fourteen teams by pushing the joystick up, down, left and right and pressing the Kick Button to confirm your choice; in a one-player game, you'll have to play (and beat) five CPU-controlled teams (which will be determined by the team you select) in five matches for the championship and if a second player inserts his or her coin on the "SCHEDULE" screen (which tells you who your first opponents are going to be), the text "NEW CHALLENGER COMING UP" shall appear on the screen (and the game will go back to the team selection screen, to let him or her select one of the thirteen remaining teams). You shall now have twenty seconds to select one of eight different team formations (4-3-3, 4-5-1, 3-5-2, 3-4-3, 5-3-2, 4-4-2, D. VOLANTE, SWEEPR) by pushing the joystick up and down, and pressing the Kick Button to confirm your choice (in a one-player game, the CPU shall have automatically chosen 3-5-2 when the formation selection screen appears) - and the screen will then fade into a shot of the centre of a stadium's pitch, as the text "KICK OFF" appears in the centre of it. Two blue and red shadows will then appear underneath the feet of the first players to start under players' control (their names are displayed at the bottom of the screen!); however, for a one-player game, one of the coloured shadows, depending on which side's not being used, will not be present. As in V-Shoot, if the ball goes off the pitch the text "THROW IN" (or "CORNER KICK", if it went off at one of the corners) will appear on the screen - but this time, you'll have to use the joystick to rotate the player and the Kick Button to make him kick the ball back onto the pitch (also, in a case of the ball going off pitch at either of the goals and the text "GOAL KICK" appearing on the screen, the goalkeeper will take the kick automatically). When either team scores a goal, the text "GOAL" will appear on the screen; the action will then get replayed at a slightly higher speed from three different angles, including for own goals. When the timer at the top of the screen runs out (depending on how the cabinet is set it can range from 1:00 to 3:00 at the start of a match) the text "TIME UP" will appear on the screen as the result flies into view from its right side - and an NS1-era World Stadium-like newspaper will then scroll up into view from the bottom of the screen, with the Kanji headline of the winning team name in red and either shōri (勝利), shinshō (辛勝), or asshō (圧勝) in blue (determined by whether the win was a narrow or landslide victory), a photograph of one of the winning team's players (or several of its fans waving their flags) below it, and the winning team mascot and paper's name Namusupo (ナムスポ) to its right (Namusupo is short for "Namco Sports"). In a one-player game, you will proceed to the next match (if you won), or will be given twenty seconds to insert another coin and replay the current match (if you lost); however, in a two-player game, the game shall be over for the losing player and it will segue into one-player mode. However, as in the aforementioned V-Shoot, if the score is drawn after the timer runs out...
...the screen shall fade back into that shot of the centre of the stadium's pitch (there are several different ones, but like those of the Japan League from Kyūkai Dōchūki, they're randomly selected by the game), as the text "V-GOAL" appears on it (this is the equivalent of "EXTRA GAME", from the earlier game) - and the timer shall range from 0:30 to 2:00 here. As soon as a team scores a goal they shall win the match as the text "GOAL" appears on the screen, the text "V-GOAL" appears again in its top-right corner and the result flies into view from its right side (unless it was an own goal), but if neither team manages to score a goal before the timer runs out, the text "PK" shall appear on the screen (you may remember from the earlier game that these letters stand for "Penalty Kick"); both players (or you and the CPU) shall, again, take turns in front of each other's goals. The attacking player must use the joystick to direct the player's shot while the defending one must use the joystick in conjunction with the Kick Button to make the goalkeeper jump in an attempt to save it - and if the shot goes in the player will punch the air as the goalkeeper drops to the ground and hides his head in his hands, but if the keeper saves it it will be the other way around. Hits will again get indicated at the bottom of the screen with an O, and misses with an X; whichever team scores the most hits after ten penalties (five for each player), will win the match, but if both teams have scored the same number of hits after this point, you (and the other player, in a two-player game) will be given twenty seconds to insert another (or two more) coin(s) to replay the current match. And, if you manage to beat all five of the CPU-controlled teams in the one-player mode, you'll be able to sit back and enjoy this game's ending credits:
The text "GAME OVER" shall then appear on the screen, and the game shall go back into attract mode and show the teams' rankings and percentages.