Reverse 1999 by Bluepoch just landed on the App Store and Play Store, but it’s already on the radar of every mobile RPG enthusiast.
That’s to be expected of a game that provides a clean experience, top-tier voice acting, and sleek aesthetics that brilliantly combine futuristic and vintage styles. Its premise revolves around traveling across time to save Arcanists from the “Storm.”
This ultimate guide will accompany you through the entire gameplay of Reverse 1999. Make sure you read through the end for crucial tips.
Photo: Bluepoch
Starting Off in Reverse 1999
You will play as the Timekeeper, an entity that can jump from era to era and sense the “Storm” that removes Arcanists or magic users from their timeline.
There’s a laid-out story for you to follow. You can learn more about the world of Reverse 1999 by listening to every piece of dialogue, but you can always go straight to battle by tapping the Skip button when a cutscene comes on.
In the story map, some of the chapters have multiple stars, and some only have one. Single-star chapters don’t feature combat, but you must still play them to proceed.
Photo: Bluepoch
Trails
To unlock some chapters in Reverse 1999, you need to complete Trails. These are mini-tasks that show up on the map as glowing gold icons.
Some Trails will have you read some notes, but some will give you battles with special rules. Like in story mode, you have to pay activity points to play Trail battles.
Photo: Bluepoch
Hard Mode
After completing the first few chapters of the story, you will unlock Hard Mode, which also has special fighting rules.
This is far more difficult, but the rewards are worth it. To unlock the Hard Mode of a chapter, you must first get two stars from the regular story mode.
Photo: Bluepoch
Replay
If you think you are not yet ready for Hard Mode in Reverse 1999, you can replay cleared battle stages without changing the degree of difficulty. You can also Replay your previous fight to make things faster.
In the battle preparation panel, tap the play button beside Start. You can Replay up to four times in one go for multiplied rewards. However, this will also require more activity points.
Photo: Bluepoch
Battle System
Reverse 1999 is a turn-based RPG that smoothly blends standard mechanics with a few innovative additions here and there.
Your team of Arcanists will do the fighting for you, but as the Timekeeper, you will direct their every move. Here are some vital battle aspects that you should be familiar with for making strategic decisions.
AP
The empty card slots in the middle of your battle screen are your AP (action points) area. It indicates how many moves you can perform per turn. You will spend an AP when you either cast a skill or move one.
Photo: Bluepoch
You can tap your AP area to reset it, but once you fill out all the slots, your team will automatically start attacking. Then, it will be the enemy’s turn.
Incantations
The skills of Arcanists are called incantations. These are presented as cards on the bottom right side of your battle screen. There are stars on each card, and placing identical cards next to each other will combine them and boost their effects.
Photo: Bluepoch
Remember that manually sliding a card to a new spot will cost you an AP. To pair them up without wasting a move, you have to be strategic in picking your sequence of skills.
Skill Types
There are six types of skills. These are attack, buff, debuff, healing, counter, and ultimate. Reverse 1999 characters have three skills: one ultimate and two of the other types.
Photo: Bluepoch
Most incantations will spawn at random, except for ultimates. An ultimate will only appear when a hero’s Moxie is full. Moxie is represented by yellow diamonds below the HP of each Arcanist.
Tuning O’ One
Apart from Arcanists, there’s also a Moxie indicator for the Timekeeper. But you will only see this after unlocking Tuning O’ One, which is basically the Timekeeper’s ability.
Photo: Bluepoch
It will be placed on the bottom left side of the battle screen. Timekeeper’s Moxie increases when you cast, move, and merge incantations.
Summoning Arcanists
You can bring up to four Arcanists into battle. However, most fights will only allow you to brawl with three heroes at a time. The fourth member will be a reserve that will come out when one champion is slain.
To expand your band of sorcerers, go to the Summon panel on your home screen. There will be several summoning banners you will see. Each one features different characters with increased chances.
Photo: Bluepoch
Summoning a duplicate will give you an Artifice. You can use this for the Portray function, which will be discussed later.
For our Reverse 1999 reroll guide, click here.
Afflatus Effects
Like with many stylized games that have gacha systems, Reverse 1999’s champions belong to different classes or elements. In this game, they are called Afflatus.
There are six Afflatus: beast, plant, star, mineral, spirit, and intelligence. Beast beats plant, plant beats star, star beats mineral, and mineral beats beast. Spirit and intelligence types are outside that cycle because they are each other’s weaknesses.
Photo: Bluepoch
During battle preparation, a text spelling out “Stronger” will appear below recommended characters. You can build your team based on this.
Upgrading Arcanists
When you tap the Crew button in the home panel and select any hero, you will see all the ways to improve your character. The first one is basic Level Up, which costs Dust and Sharpodonty, two of the most common currencies in Reverse 1999.
Photo: Bluepoch
When you reach the max level, you have to upgrade Insight, and this one requires more materials. You can obtain exclusive stat boosts in Portray, but Arcanists can only use this function five times.
The last one, Resonate, lets you load different “ideas” or stat combos into a character’s brain. Like Insight, this one demands resources that are harder to come by.
Psycubes
Psycubes are another way to improve the capabilities of your champions in Reverse 1999. These are unique items that can be equipped on each of your team members’ pre-battle by tapping the small cross icon below their banners.
Photo: Bluepoch
You can enhance these objects’ stats by going to the Warehouse section on the left of your main screen. Tap Psycube, and choose any item you wish to upgrade. Then, go to Engrave.
Photo: Bluepoch
Tap the empty boxes on the right side to pick the engraving materials you want to use. You can pick Enlighten bulbs or other Psycubes to proceed. Tap Engrave and pay the Sharpodonty cost.
Alternative Battle Modes
As you progress in the main story of Reverse 1999, you will unlock many alternative battle modes. These features will be shown at the bottom of the screen when you enter story mode.
The fighting rules are generally the same, but different modes yield different types of rewards. Some modes can give you ingredients for Insight and Resonate upgrades. Let’s talk about them in detail.
Resource
This is the first alternative battle mode you will unlock in Reverse 1999, and it has a couple of sub-modes in itself. Sub-modes have varying resources as rewards.
Photo: Bluepoch
The Poussiere gives you Dust, Mintage Aesthetics provides Sharpodonty, and Harvest Prime has Wilderness upgrade materials. These three require activity points.
The fourth mode, Pneuma Analysis, lends engraving ingredients for Psycubes. Pneuma Analysis doesn’t need activity points, but it can only be played twice a day.
Insight
As the name suggests, this mode is where you can go for Insight improvement materials, aka pages.
Every Afflatus calls for a different kind of page, so there are four Afflatus sub-modes here. There’s one for beast, plant, star, and mineral. There are no dedicated sub-modes for spirit and intelligence.
Photo: Bluepoch
That’s because spirit Arcanists need plant and beast pages for Insight, while intelligence heroes require pages for star and mineral.
Artificial Somnambulism
Artificial Somnambulism puts the Timekeeper in a dream state to revisit old memories and investigate them further.
Photo: Bluepoch
Somnambulisms consist of numerous dreams, and you have to interact with objects to read stories, complete Trail-like challenges, and clear the stage.
This battle mode in Reverse 1999 is where you can stock up on Resonate materials. Beware, the battles here are tough, so you need high-level fighters to take them on.
Wilderness Functions
The Wilderness feature of Reverse 1999 is a fun and unique mini-game. You can access it beside the Crew button on your main screen.
Photo: Bluepoch
Here, you can construct islands and buildings to improve Vigor, which is the Wilderness’ resource output. That’s right, this feature supplies AFK rewards and more through its vital structures.
Paleohall
This is the main building that dictates the maximum yields of the Wilderness. You can tap it to view the progress of the other structures.
Photo: Bluepoch
You need Kern Babies to level up the Paleohall. These can only be obtained in the Harvest Prime battle mode.
AFK Rewards
There are multiple Wilderness structures that will idly produce common resources. The first ones are the Dust Bell Tower and the Sharpodonty Market.
Photo: Bluepoch
Tap them to claim their rewards anytime. You can also increase their capacity by selecting the up arrows in their creation queues. This will also require Kern Babies.
Wishing Spring
In the Wishing Spring, you can formulate all sorts of Arcanist enhancement materials. You can also make some items for Wilderness upgrades.
Photo: Bluepoch
To create anything in the Wishing Spring, tap the plus icon on the right side. Choose the formula of what you want to make and tap Craft. You typically need Sharpodonty and items of lesser rarity for this.
Placing Characters
You can place Arcanists in the Wilderness to boost your Bond with them. Your Bond with Arcanists will help you unlock character-exclusive items and stories.
Photo: Bluepoch
The number of heroes you can put in the Wilderness will depend on your Paleohall level. You can edit your chosen dwellers anytime by tapping the Place Characters button.
Reverse 1999 Tips and Tricks
With enough playing time, you will master every nook and cranny of this intricate Bluepoch product. Still, here are some ideas that will help you progress faster.
Practice Changing Targets Mid-Turn
You can always change your target by tapping other enemies before casting an incantation. This is very useful when facing foes with varying Afflatus.
Photo: Bluepoch
Pick those with weaker Afflatus to maximize skill effects. The “Stronger” text will pop up on an incantation card when you are targeting the right enemies.
Make First Resource Battles Count
You will constantly run out of common in-game currencies, and sometimes, the Wilderness rewards won’t cut it in Reverse 1999. That’s why you will constantly find yourself in resource battle modes.
It’s wise to finish your first fight in as few turns as possible so that you won’t spend a lot of time when you choose to Replay later on.
Use Disarm Skills Wisely
Enemies will perform direct attacks when a red sword icon appears above their heads. You can cancel them out by casting incantations with disarm effects, like Sonetto’s two-star debuff.
Photo: Bluepoch
The best use of disarm skills is when one enemy is setting up two or three attacks. Neutralizing them in one move can make their entire turn useless and instantly give you the edge.
Deploy Healers for Weak Formations
If your crew lacks heroes of recommended Afflatus in a battle, sometimes you may have no choice but to utilize neutral characters.
When experiencing this predicament, it’s useful to have a healer or support character to ensure your team lasts until the end of the fight. Alternatively, you can take note of the next tip.
Have One High-Level Hero of Each Afflatus
It is advised to have one high-level Arcanist in every class in Reverse 1999. This is especially true for Artificial Somnambulism, where progressing through its stages is very grueling because Afflatus recommendations are so unpredictable.
If having a high-level Arcanist for every Afflatus is too much, prioritize beast, star, plant, and mineral combatants.
Photo: Bluepoch
Learn more about building teams in Reverse 1999 by clicking here.
Final Words
It’s not just the art style that is so well put together in Reverse 1999. It’s everything. From the detailed world-building to the clever turn-based mechanics, everything comes across as very sophisticated. It’s a real treat for gacha and RPG fans.
