I decided that Sonic Rush just isn't worth playing. There's level memorization in all Sonic games but it's just horrible in Sonic Rush and life is too short. Good thing I have Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones on my 3DS as well.

I have just beaten the initial set of eight chapters and, I must say, so far it is ridiculously good. I am playing on easy (which is default and I always play the default difficulty first, figuring that is where the devs probably put the most effort). Even so I've had a rough time getting through w/o anyone dying. I am looking forward to really digging into this one for sure. There is a great deal of depth here, between weapons, magic, different characters and so on and it feels like you really get to customize your party to your liking. My one complaint is it's really hard to level up weaker characters w/o them inadvertantly dying on you but that challenge is for the better since it just means you really, really have to pay attention to every last detail on the screen. It does make it tempting to just use your best characters and leave the underlings huddled in a corner somewhere though. Still, I am pressing on and trying to use all the weapons at my disposal. I really hope the rest of the game is as good as the beginning.