In my opinion, the most unfairly hated game in the series. It's a significant step up from Dream Team, has some of the most fun combat in the series (second to Bowser's Inside Story), and manages to make exploration mostly fun and enjoyable again.

I feel like the main criticism came from it's mistreatment of the Paper Mario IP, and how it's not utilised properly. And I agree! It's not what it could have been. But neither is Paper Mario. This was after Sticker Star gutted the series, and at the end of the day this was never going to save Paper Mario - it's still ultimately a Mario and Luigi game.

The addition of a third party member makes exploration and combat far more interesting, as well as opening the door to more interesting variants on Bros. Attacks with Trio Attacks. It can get a little overwhelming at times, but I find most combat encounters did a good job at balancing all 3 members and the red targeting circle helps a lot in preventing that confusion.

Paper Mario's extra floaty jump, as well as his Copy ability and how it changes the requirements of action commands and serves as a damage shield is a great way to keep him from being just another version of Mario and Luigi.

Papercraft Battles serve as an alright replacement to Giant Battles. Personally, I prefer Giant but I have to appreciate the attempt to do something else instead of the same thing for a third time.

I think by far the weakest aspect is the story. It's never been a big thing in these games, but in this one its essentially non existent. The structure is insane, for example bringing you to the castle for a tiny visit, then making you do a pitstop at an old area, and immediately bringing you back to a castle. The only notable characters outside the main ones are Bowser Jr. and Paper Bowser Jr. and even then they don't really do much outside a few funny moments and nice Bowser-Being-A-Dad scenes.