Zomg weird glitch!

[Tokimadoushi]

This is a message from my unfortunate partner:

"I was in the World of Ruin, 15-20 hours into the game and powerlevelling. I decided to take on Leviathan, who killed my Lv. 29 characters in a single attack.
However, this is where the weird s#!t starts...I got the game over screen, screen went blank and then all of a sudden I was back in the World of Balance outside Narshe!
My characters are all on the same level (29-31), but my stats are higher than they were before I fought Leviathan. The game clock now reads 4:20 and I'm at the part where you have to search for Terra (beginning with going to Kohlingen, then Zozo, etc).
What the hell happened?! Did Leviathan transport me back in time? Has anyone else experienced this?
I'm playing the GBA version on the Visualboy Advance emulator, I had only one save file (the one I was playing on at the time I fought Leviathan and got transported back to the World of Balance). I am sooo confused, and I can't reload my old save state because I saved right before I encountered Leviathan. So I kinda just have to go with the flow "

WTF???!!

P.S. Oh and he doesn't have any of the items he had from before he fought Leviathan, he's back to having the items he had at that point in the World of Balance.

[Depression Moon]

I'm playing the GBA version on the Visualboy Advance

The Visualboy? Did Nintendo make a seqeul to that awful Virtua Boy?

[Tokimadoushi]

The Visualboy is a GBA emulator, sorry should've worded myself better

[blackmage_nuke]

Im not entirely sure but i think when you die you appear back at your last save (not save state) with all your levels intact. So is it posible you made a normal save in the world of balance and kept using save states from then on?
Or is it possible you accidentally loaded a state which sometimes wipes normal saves?

[Tokimadoushi]

No, only save states were used, no normal saves. That's the strange thing, that technically the game should've gone back to the title screen after the party was killed because there were no saves to reload or detect, but it just went straight back to world of balance. Strange days indeed!

[Jiro]

That is quite a strange occurrence and I haven't a clue what could have caused it. Except, I believe that if you touch a save point, it "checkpoints" for you. So you will return there on a game over, but can't load from there or anything of the sort.

[Setzer the Gambler]

I've never played it on the GBA, but I do remember playing it on the snes and playing it for so long that the cartridge overheated.
I was fighting one of them brachiosaurus thing and then something started floating in the screen, some kind of knife.
Then someone turned into another character and the whole screen became different and stuff.
I had to reset the cartridge, I was scared I had lost my game. :P

[KainHighwind]

No, only save states were used, no normal saves.

I believe that if you touch a save point, it "checkpoints" for you. So you will return there on a game over, but can't load from there or anything of the sort.

It sounds like this is probably the answer.

You kids today and your save states. Harumph.