Need help RE: Sword Of Mana (GBA) ~ Levelling up glitch

[Gemini-Phoenix]

I started playing Sword Of Mana a few years ago, but put it down and never went back to it before now. I had played through at least 15 hours worth of the game as the Female character, but during the period of not playing, i'd realised i'd forgotten everything i've done to that point, therefore I decided to start again...

This time, I decided to play as the Male character. After a long tedious intro story (Is it me, or do all of Square's games on the GBA have these?), I found myself in a dungeon with a few NPC's and a statue. It didn't take me long to figure out what I had to do, and after a while I was being turfed out of the water by a strange rabbit-looking fellow. So far, so good...

Upon proceeding to the next screen and "Rescuing" the girl from the monster, I decided to spend a few moments grinding and randomly killing off Rabites which appeared in the grass. In no time at all, I had "LV. UP" above my head. Soon afterwards, the girl also had "LV. UP" appear, but this vanished quickly, but it was still displayed above the main characters head... ~ Thinking this was a bit odd, I checked my Stats menu. Her level had gone from LV 5 to LV 6, but the main character's level had stayed at Level 1. I then decided to spend a good half hour grinding, and as her levels changed (All the way to Level 10), his level stayed at Level 1, with only my weapon level going up. I saved at a statue, and went back into the game, but alas the glitch was still there.


I decided to start the game again. Skipped past all the tedious text at the beginning, killed off the Jackal, fished out of the water again. Rescued the bit of skirt, bashed a few monsters around, and... Again, couldn't level up.

What is going on with this game? Surely I should be able to level up at this point? Is this normal behaviour for the Male storyline, or is there a glitch that I should know about which prevents me from levelling up? Why is the other character able to level up and the main character isn't?

[Poofta!]

i dont think you can level up this early in the game. go forward a little more, i think then the lvl up system for your main char activates.

[shoes23]

You need to open up the action ring (the place where you select what weapon you want, manage items, ect) by pressing start or select I believe (it's been a while since I've played), and there you will find "level up". When you select it you can assign your new level to one of six classes which affect your attributes.

[Gemini-Phoenix]

Thanks guys. Helped a lot! Seems I just needed to proceed a little further and I would've learned all about levelling up! Lol. Seems I jumped the gun a little, and my keen sense of perception got me all anxious.