I haven't played a Kingdom Hearts game since the original about 5 or 6 years ago. My memory is more than a little foggy, so I really had no idea what was going on story-wise in this new game.
I have been told that I must play KH2 in order to know who all the characters are, but as of today I seem to have a grasp on what is going on so far.
The gameplay is almost identical to what I can remember of the original KH, only there is no Donald Duck or Goofy. You play as Roxas, as opposed to Sora. Roxas is somehow connected to Sora though. (I am currently on Day 75, I suppose I will find out more later.) The panel system so far is very interesting and flexible. Its kind of a combination of the materia system in FF7 and the sphere grid of FFX-- only completely and totally different in every way
The story plays out like Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, being that everything is mission based, and the key elements of the story occur during those missions. Aside from that, it feels very much like reading a book.
It feels almost as if you ARE Roxas, and the day to day jobs and missions are the actual days of your life. It is a very strange feeling that I have never gotten from any game before...
For a Nintendo DS game, it has amazing graphics and sound, which includes a surprising amount of voice acting.
It started out kind of slow with the tutorials, but overall I am very impressed so far.