It's pretty good, and it was my favorite launch title. It's not like the other paper marios, it's more like the side scroller that came out on the DS, but it has some stuff in common with the old school ones. You can use items to attack if you want, and to heal. And you also level up by fighting mobs and you upgrade HP, FP, and BP through it. It also has some redundant and annoying parts in it like the old ones, where you have to jump in place a bunch, or run around a huge enviroment trying to find the one out of place object.
Overall it's worth a play through, I'd recommend a rent rather than a buy though.
Overall it's worth a play through, I'd recommend a rent rather than a buy though.