Heart. Papers. Border.

Jovian Industries, Pronoia AB · Pronoia AB

Released: Aug 20, 2017
Platforms
Last updated: 12 Sep 2026, 15:52 GMT

Wishlist on Steam

Watch Set price alert

Updates & announcements

20 posts

22 Sep 2022Developer post
Heart. Papers. Border. goes to sleep
Hey everyone, For a long time, I thought I can find a way to finish this game. But Heart. Papers. Border. is just too difficult for me to continue. Not just because I am alone in developing this, but because this project holds too much of my painful past. I simply cannot look at
15 Mar 2022Developer post
Please don't buy me - a status update
Hey everyone! I want to give you all an update about this project, which is, it is not abandoned. Currently, this IP is transferred to my new company. I will eventually be able to fund its development. But until that is possible, I must focus on other projects, specifically Lost
12 Oct 2020Developer post
Puzzle time! HPB now has them - and also, join our dev updates forum!
The puzzle thing is becoming reality! Its not exactly pretty right now, but It Works! Help us out - we find making this puzzle quite soothing. Is it just us? Are we suffering from creative blindness? Or is this new puzzle mechanic a little bit soothing for realz? You can try this
The puzzle thing is becoming reality!
Its not exactly pretty right now, but It Works! Help us out - we find making this puzzle quite soothing. Is it just us? Are we suffering from creative blindness? Or is this new puzzle mechanic a little bit soothing for realz? You can try this right now if you access the dev branch - its not password protected:

right click Heart. Papers. Border. in your library, and then go to Properties
in Properties, go to the tab called BETAS
here, you can select in_dev - Development Branch
We also started a shiny new Topic on our Steam Discussion board, where we'll be posting a lot of tiny day to day updates and WIP glimpses. And we'll be spicing up our regular HPB Design Sesh with Broadcasts! If you don't have the time to try the new puzzle by yourself, we will stream on Thursdays in the afternoon.
So come onboard on the HPB Community Hub and talk HBP design & development with us! If you ever wanted to taste how it really feels to make an indie game, we hope this will offer a fairly good idea!
Original post
01 Oct 2020Developer post
HBP Design Sesh: Public Backlog & Dev Branch
Game development is quite dramatic. It ebbs and flows and breaks your heart a million times a day... sometimes. But the problem is - all the drama is in your head. To an outsider, it looks like this: On occasion, it may look like this: but in reality, it's usually like this: ...a
Game development is quite dramatic. It ebbs and flows and breaks your heart a million times a day... sometimes. But the problem is - all the drama is in your head. To an outsider, it looks like this:
On occasion, it may look like this:
but in reality, it's usually like this:
...and it feels way too often like this:
Now, we can't share memes all the time (or... can we?!...) but we CAN share some of the drama. Worry not, it will make little sense to most of you! :D
The HBP Backlog
Here is what we are working on, what we are going to work on, what we worked on and what we will probably never work on:
We use Pivotal Tracker to keep our backlog, and making a project public is actually part of this tool's free suite - I guess they are hoping we'd convince you to use it, too (it's a really good agile project management tool, actually).
The blue lines are releases and we use them to loosely define our goal for "major-ish" updates. What's above the blue line needs to be done by that time/ for that update. What's below is for the next blue line. We are hoping for about 6 blue lines until the end of spring, when ... nope. I am too afraid to write it down.
You can check out our backlog Right Here.
The HPB Dev Branch
We keep a very up to date build on Steam in our dev branch. You can check out the latest HPB too, but treat with caution - it's on the dev branch, and not release, for a good reason! To access the Heart. Papers. Border. dev branch, you have to:

right click Heart. Papers. Border. in your library, and then go to Properties
in Properties, go to the tab called BETAS
here, you can select in_dev - Development Branch
We did not put any password for it. This branch gets a lot of updates and is unstable, but when you start the game you can now see....
The News! Not the boring world goes insane kind of news that are popular on TV these days, but THESE news about Heart. Papers. Border.! Isn't that neat?
Original post
20 Sep 2020Developer post
HPB Design Sesh: changing Everything* while learning how to KISS!!!
Some of you have been buying this lill monster even though we warned you not to. We hope you won't get scared of it but instead join forces with us to turn it into a beautiful.... ehm. Butterfly?! Meanwhile - THANK YOU! It would help us a ton to know why you recently bought this
Some of you have been buying this lill monster even though we warned you not to. We hope you won't get scared of it but instead join forces with us to turn it into a beautiful.... ehm. Butterfly?! Meanwhile - THANK YOU! It would help us a ton to know why you recently bought this little monster called Heart. Papers. Border. Was it the price tag, or was it more? Hold nothing back, tell us everything (no asterisk!) HERE.
Learning how to KISS

Now, let's start with the rule: Keep It Simple, Stupid! Aka KISS.
Anyone who has every designed a game in earnest know that this is... Very Freakin' Difficult. Because you always want to make the best game possible, and the best idea always comes tomorrow. Today's ideas are rarely good enough. Nor is today's code, art, sound, you name it. This is what makes game developers artists. And what leads to the horror of all horrors, feature creep.
There are a few ways to stand up to feature creep. The two we chose is to let you hold us accountable and to constantly keep KISS in mind. Which is why the new design will start very simple - childish, even. We want to make sure the base is solid before we build on it.
Everything* changes!

Ground zero is to clean up this mess but once done to a sufficient degree, Heart. Papers. Border. will become a puzzle collector and a logistics brain game. Thankfully this change takes the game away from judgement, too. The faith of the world no longer falls on your shoulder, nor are you in a more or less privileged position to complete your task. Real life does a good enough job at letting us to imagine that - so we will do our best to entertain you in Heart. Papers. Border. We interrupt this program for a short, but insightful College Humor travel clip:
Watch on YouTube
The main systems we plan to implement are:

a travel planner that lets you schedule your travels for up to a point in the future and then hit Play to make these plans happen
a commission system where you'll know if important events are happening in a certain place, so you can setup your travels to catch them (or not) - as a photojournalist would
a puzzle collector where you collect all the puzzles in a country, and some puzzles require you to be there at certain, specific times
The game loop will be plan your travel so you can hop from country to country and objective to objective, while catching the temporary happenings in the best way you can. We absolutely want to keep some of the existing systems, like visas, deportations, universal basic income and the blog-turned-photoblog, but first things first and only if they truly click with these new systems. But, like, we Really wanna keep deportations....
The puzzle collector will likely be first and we already posted a hint about how it will look:
We hope to be posting a game update sometimes in October. We really count on you to get Heart. Papers. Border. right this time, so if you think we should keep a certain system, or if you have opinions about these new ideas, please let us know!
Original post
14 Sep 2020Developer post
HPB Design Sesh: A feature creep horror story & a Monster discount
Once upon a time, I wanted to Change The World (tm) with a game. This game. I was younger, stupid definitely more naive and a ton less experienced. This is why Heart. Papers. Border. mutated very fast from a cute little travel game As One Should Do For Her First Commercial Indie
Once upon a time, I wanted to Change The World (tm) with a game. This game. I was younger, ~~stupid~~ definitely more naive and a ton less experienced. This is why Heart. Papers. Border. mutated very fast from a cute little travel game As One Should Do For Her First Commercial Indie into a Grand Strategy horror fuficulator* with confusing SJW elements and a terrifying amount of systems and complexities.
Warning! Here's a bunch of disturbing and really terrifying Unity screenshots:
I am really sorry you had to see this.
I do not know what was in my head.
But back in 2018, a HPB country ended up having a geographical area, streets and vegetation, a bunch of objectives to visit And Also:

a visa that must be bought, has a processing time and expires;
a flag and a passport stamp;
a cost of living - later, depending on the objective you were at, cause it wasn't enough;
travel costs TO the country and IN the country;
a deportation, of course, with a country specific fine;
country specific UBI;
starting money;
network connection quality!!! I mean how plausible is to Just Blog in a Retro futuristic imagined planet;
chance encounters that may happen more or less;
ideal visit duration Per Objective;
oh right. Hashtags!!!! Per each objective!!!! and in 5. FIVE! Separate. Categories.
As months passed by, we tried to fix this horror. And it was a very painful task, not only because of external reasons, but because, as you can see, we were dealing with a monster. And my brain was finally accepting the reality that knowing - in theory - how game design should be is no guarantee for not royally phookin up anyhow.
So now, among designing properly simple and humane new mechanics, we must first face this monster and give it a serious feature cut. Almost everything must go. I am placing HPB on a Monster discount until we can give it a proper trim. Beware though - it'll be a bit until we can nurse Heart. Papers. Border. to decency. At least we are doing it Very Publicly so you can PLEASE pull the alarm as soon as you feel its needed.
Bonus!
I give ye an easy and comprehensive guide on how NOT to have fun with naming your files! Please observe the classics:

"HPB_marketing_final_hashtag_famous_last_words"
"HPB_marketing_final_hashtag_famous_last_words_except_they_wernt" (they really weren't, nor were they these ones, actually)
... and my favourite:
"HPB_map_its_starting_too_look_cool_and_all_with_all_that_ui_stuff_going_on_but_im_gonna_stop_now_cause_we_dont_like_novells_in_file_names"
* don't even ask
Original post
13 Sep 2020Developer post
HPB Design Sesh: Complete The Picture
In Heart. Papers. Border. , you are a traveller set to experience everything planet Heart has to offer. As you travel from country to country and from landmark to landmark, you gather hashtags that you can use to write a blog about your travels. When I started designing Heart. Pa
08 Sep 2020Developer post
Lights on! We're back - Heart. Papers. Border. continues
It's been a while. If you are reading this, we owe you a great deal of gratitude. You held on to a tiny promise that we did not yet keep. We said " life happened " and you trusted us that we won't bury Heart. Papers. Border. That we'll eventually turn the lights back on. The life
27 Oct 2018Developer post
It's been a long time coming - update 0.1.5.20841
FLASHING LIGHTS WARNING! We added a Day/ Night cycle and it can be upsetting if you have problems with flashing lights. This is by default ON but you can turn it OFF in the Settings. It can be disturbing especially if you play the game on Fast Forward/ high speed. Hey everyone! I
FLASHING LIGHTS WARNING!
We added a Day/ Night cycle and it can be upsetting if you have problems with flashing lights. This is by default ON but you can turn it OFF in the Settings. It can be disturbing especially if you play the game on Fast Forward/ high speed.
Hey everyone!
It's been a long time since we updated Heart. Papers. Border.. So this update is pretty big, and I will probably forget to mention some of the stuff we have added. The game is, however, far from done. I look forward for your feedback!
What is new

All the countries for which we have graphics done are now available and can be visited once you finish the last quest in Sputnik City. They DO NOT have any quests, encounters or hashtags yet, however
We added a day/night cycle which needs *A LOT* of tweaking but I think it adds to the game
You can now see how much time you spend in every objective and in every country, in the SpacePad Location app
We added the so called Birthday Mechanic which means you get a Space Cake when you grow older :) For now this is just aesthetics but this plays a crucial role for the end game
We added more portraits you can play with, all of them inspired by fantastic real life people to whom we owe a great deal of thanks <3
When you start a new game, we randomize the selection of portrait and gender
We started to work on Influence. This is by far ready, but you can see how influential you are in each country from the SpacePad Location app
The Blog has been optimized to support double click. So just double click on the hashtags you want to use
We have done countless minor updates which should make the game play smoother
We probably added more stuff that we forgot to keep track of. Note to self - keep track of what you add!
There are many KNOWN ISSUES.
Like some of the popups overlap in a non optimal way, many of them can be cut which is super annoying. Notifications pile up and we will refactor that system so you can use the SpacePad to browse through notifications instead of letting them clutter the UI. The Day / Night cycle is something that needs a lot of optimizing and frankly I am super eager to make the night version of our objectives and I also want to work with the roads for this.
Keep in mind - when you unlock all countries, you can see the TRAVEL button active but if you do not have enough uNits, nothing happens when you click on it. We will disable it with a message if you do not have enough uNits, just like it happens when you don't have a visa.
And of course there is a lot of work to do for the influence system, the SpacePad in general and Blog minigame in particular, and I will redesign the entire encounter/ quest system. Just so you know - its a long way to go.
Enjoy! :)
Laura aka Sarienn
/overworking Sebi's coding skills since 2017
Original post
29 May 2018Developer post
Updates are coming (aka, this project is not abandoned)
Hey awesome people! We are still working on HPB. Slowly, because life happened in pretty extreme ways, but we have no intention to abandon this project. Those of you who have beta access might have noticed that we unlocked all countries. We do not have quests and encounters yet,
02 Mar 2018Developer post
100 stories of Heart. Papers. Border.
As we prepare to publish all the content that is graphically done in Heart. Papers. Border. , we started to write the stories that inspired and motivated us to make this game. The first post is about planet Heart and its real life source of inspiration, Proxima Centauri b. Warnin
02 Mar 2018Developer post
100 stories of Heart. Papers. Border.
As we prepare to publish all the content that is graphically done in Heart. Papers. Border. , we started to write the stories that inspired and motivated us to make this game. The first post is about planet Heart and its real life source of inspiration, Proxima Centauri b. Warnin
21 Feb 2018Developer post
A Wild Update Appears!
Hey awesome people! We finally managed to push a new update, which we call Update 2.2! I am sorry it took so long - we are both working and struggling to pay all our dues. What is in the update? A consistent bunch of bug fixes and painfully mandatory refactoring that's always bor
Hey awesome people!
We finally managed to push a new update, which we call Update 2.2! I am sorry it took so long - we are both working and struggling to pay all our dues.
What is in the update?

A consistent bunch of bug fixes and painfully mandatory refactoring that's always boring to read about. Suffice to say the game should move much better and faster now, so tell us if you do notice a difference
New time control buttons and functionality which should be sleeker and prettier. Play and Play Faster are now combined
Finally, filters for hashtags in the blog, which I hope are a good step towards a better blog UI. Filters explain what hashtags are, and they can also be used for sorting. This is just the beginning though, we will improve the blog much more!
Finally, you can now easily remove used hashtags cause they have the requested X button now. If you remove a title, all tags are removed as well
You can now see how much time you spent in each objective and in each country, in the info popup that you get when you click on the objective and also in the Location app in the SpacePad
We tweaked how encounters and quests are given, so you get some on Day 1 of your visit
SORRY! The Linux build has issues. We're on it!
What's up next?
We have quite a lot of graphical assets done for many of the countries which are now locked. In an ideal world, we would have liked to release this progressively, but since we are so stretched for time, we decided to push all we have. So the next update will unlock all the countries, of which some are more done than others, and also some 60+ new objectives to visit. We will not have quests and encounters for them, though.
Also...
I will keep you all way more up to date with how development progresses. Please do subscribe to our newsletter, since it is the most non invasive and wanted way to keep you all informed, if you want!
Original post
21 Feb 2018Developer post
A Wild Update Appears!
Hey awesome people! We finally managed to push a new update, which we call Update 2.2! I am sorry it took so long - we are both working and struggling to pay all our dues. What is in the update? A consistent bunch of bug fixes and painfully mandatory refactoring that's always bor
Hey awesome people!
We finally managed to push a new update, which we call Update 2.2! I am sorry it took so long - we are both working and struggling to pay all our dues.
What is in the update?

A consistent bunch of bug fixes and painfully mandatory refactoring that's always boring to read about. Suffice to say the game should move much better and faster now, so tell us if you do notice a difference
New time control buttons and functionality which should be sleeker and prettier. Play and Play Faster are now combined
Finally, filters for hashtags in the blog, which I hope are a good step towards a better blog UI. Filters explain what hashtags are, and they can also be used for sorting. This is just the beginning though, we will improve the blog much more!
Finally, you can now easily remove used hashtags cause they have the requested X button now. If you remove a title, all tags are removed as well
You can now see how much time you spent in each objective and in each country, in the info popup that you get when you click on the objective and also in the Location app in the SpacePad
We tweaked how encounters and quests are given, so you get some on Day 1 of your visit
SORRY! The Linux build has issues. We're on it!
What's up next?
We have quite a lot of graphical assets done for many of the countries which are now locked. In an ideal world, we would have liked to release this progressively, but since we are so stretched for time, we decided to push all we have. So the next update will unlock all the countries, of which some are more done than others, and also some 60+ new objectives to visit. We will not have quests and encounters for them, though.
Also...
I will keep you all way more up to date with how development progresses. Please do subscribe to our newsletter, since it is the most non invasive and wanted way to keep you all informed, if you want!
Original post
23 Jan 2018Developer post
Updates on updates ^^
Hello awesome people! Those of you with access to the dev branch might have noticed some new stuff: Time control buttons have a new face and new condensed functionality. We combined Play with Fast forward. They are not final yet, cause I need to reexport new backgrounds. You can
Hello awesome people!
Those of you with access to the dev branch might have noticed some new stuff:

Time control buttons have a new face and new condensed functionality. We combined Play with Fast forward. They are not final yet, cause I need to reexport new backgrounds.
You can now see how much time you spent on every objective, both in the info popup and in the SpacePad. This includes the travel hub as well
You can even see how much time you spent in a country in total. This is in the Location app in the SpacePad
In the Blog, all hashtags now have a handy X (remove) button so you can remove them from your post
Removing the title hashtag automatically removes all other hashtags
Of course, a bunch of bugs have been squashed. They are all virtual so no real bug was actually harmed during this development ^^
We want to add a bit more stuff before we push this update on the Release branch. Specifically, at the very least we will add hashtag filters in the blog, and then we will focus on adding all the content that we have ready. Warning, there will be a bunch of spoiler alerts here in the community hub.
I want to thank you all again for your patience!
Over & Out
Lara
Original post
23 Jan 2018Developer post
Updates on updates ^^
Hello awesome people! Those of you with access to the dev branch might have noticed some new stuff: Time control buttons have a new face and new condensed functionality. We combined Play with Fast forward. They are not final yet, cause I need to reexport new backgrounds. You can
Hello awesome people!
Those of you with access to the dev branch might have noticed some new stuff:

Time control buttons have a new face and new condensed functionality. We combined Play with Fast forward. They are not final yet, cause I need to reexport new backgrounds.
You can now see how much time you spent on every objective, both in the info popup and in the SpacePad. This includes the travel hub as well
You can even see how much time you spent in a country in total. This is in the Location app in the SpacePad
In the Blog, all hashtags now have a handy X (remove) button so you can remove them from your post
Removing the title hashtag automatically removes all other hashtags
Of course, a bunch of bugs have been squashed. They are all virtual so no real bug was actually harmed during this development ^^
We want to add a bit more stuff before we push this update on the Release branch. Specifically, at the very least we will add hashtag filters in the blog, and then we will focus on adding all the content that we have ready. Warning, there will be a bunch of spoiler alerts here in the community hub.
I want to thank you all again for your patience!
Over & Out
Lara
Original post
15 Jan 2018Developer post
Updates are coming!
Hello awesome people! We had a very difficult time in our personal lives which slowed down the development of Heart. Papers. Border. dramatically. We know this is no excuse and we are very sorry for this long period of silence. We are however as committed as ever to this project
Hello awesome people!
We had a very difficult time in our personal lives which slowed down the development of Heart. Papers. Border. dramatically. We know this is no excuse and we are very sorry for this long period of silence.
We are however as committed as ever to this project and we are now able to pick up more speed with development. So we are planning 2 updates, a minor one and a major one as follows:
MINOR UPDATE

new, proper and pretty time control buttons as well as combined Play/ Pause functionality
some important quests will now be awarded as soon as you reach the needed destination
hashtags used in a blog post will now have CLOSE buttons so you can easily remove them
a bunch of bugs will be fixed
The ETA is as soon as possible, we aim to push this update next week.
MAJOR UPDATE

we aim to import all the graphical content we have ready in the game. This means about 10 more countries with cca 50 new objectives to visit. This is not all the content we plan for the game but it is what is done now art wise.
we will introduce a Creative mode that will allow everyone to add new Encounters fro any objective.
This is a significant update and we do not know when we will be ready with it. We will update the beta branch with the new content as soon as possible and keep you up to date about the support for traveller generated content.
We have a long backlog ahead of us. We have a lot of features we need to add, including the Influence and a much better blog design. And we also have a lot of content to do. We are very committed to finish this game, and we want to thank you for your patience with Heart. Papers. Border.
Over & Out
L
Original post
15 Jan 2018Developer post
Updates are coming!
Hello awesome people! We had a very difficult time in our personal lives which slowed down the development of Heart. Papers. Border. dramatically. We know this is no excuse and we are very sorry for this long period of silence. We are however as committed as ever to this project
Hello awesome people!
We had a very difficult time in our personal lives which slowed down the development of Heart. Papers. Border. dramatically. We know this is no excuse and we are very sorry for this long period of silence.
We are however as committed as ever to this project and we are now able to pick up more speed with development. So we are planning 2 updates, a minor one and a major one as follows:
MINOR UPDATE

new, proper and pretty time control buttons as well as combined Play/ Pause functionality
some important quests will now be awarded as soon as you reach the needed destination
hashtags used in a blog post will now have CLOSE buttons so you can easily remove them
a bunch of bugs will be fixed
The ETA is as soon as possible, we aim to push this update next week.
MAJOR UPDATE

we aim to import all the graphical content we have ready in the game. This means about 10 more countries with cca 50 new objectives to visit. This is not all the content we plan for the game but it is what is done now art wise.
we will introduce a Creative mode that will allow everyone to add new Encounters fro any objective.
This is a significant update and we do not know when we will be ready with it. We will update the beta branch with the new content as soon as possible and keep you up to date about the support for traveller generated content.
We have a long backlog ahead of us. We have a lot of features we need to add, including the Influence and a much better blog design. And we also have a lot of content to do. We are very committed to finish this game, and we want to thank you for your patience with Heart. Papers. Border.
Over & Out
L
Original post
19 Nov 2017Developer post
HPB Major update now up!
Hello awesome people! You might have noticed that we pushed a major update on Friday. It contains a completely refactored time and travel system, and it also reintroduces the Pause and Fast Forward controls. We also sped up the duration of a day, and we hope this will make the ga
Hello awesome people!
You might have noticed that we pushed a major update on Friday. It contains a completely refactored time and travel system, and it also reintroduces the Pause and Fast Forward controls. We also sped up the duration of a day, and we hope this will make the gameplay much better - what do you think?
Updates:

Overhaul of the travelling system - now you can travel from objective to objective
Travel Hub - each country has a travel hub that acts as a normal objective, however it is the only place that allows you to travel abroad. This is something we need to somehow show in the UI and it is not obvious right now - On It!
Pause/ Fast Forward/ Normal time buttons are back You can use now buttons to stop/normalize/accelerate time
Visiting Objectives no longer has a set visit duration. You can spend as much time as you want in an objective and the more time you spend, the more valuable encounters and hashtags you will find
Cost of Living is no longer per country, but per objective
The SpacePad Location app is now generated using dynamic data. Before, all the country brochures were made by hand (don't tell anyone^^ but you know how they say - fake it till you make it!)
The usual pbug fixes and performance optimizations that every dev team likes to brag with :D
We also have new graphics for the Location app and also new flags. For the next major update we will concentrate a bit more on content, as we know it is sorely needed!
We could REALLY use your feedback!
Best!
L
Original post
19 Nov 2017Developer post
HPB Major update now up!
Hello awesome people! You might have noticed that we pushed a major update on Friday. It contains a completely refactored time and travel system, and it also reintroduces the Pause and Fast Forward controls. We also sped up the duration of a day, and we hope this will make the ga
Hello awesome people!
You might have noticed that we pushed a major update on Friday. It contains a completely refactored time and travel system, and it also reintroduces the Pause and Fast Forward controls. We also sped up the duration of a day, and we hope this will make the gameplay much better - what do you think?
Updates:

Overhaul of the travelling system - now you can travel from objective to objective
Travel Hub - each country has a travel hub that acts as a normal objective, however it is the only place that allows you to travel abroad. This is something we need to somehow show in the UI and it is not obvious right now - On It!
Pause/ Fast Forward/ Normal time buttons are back You can use now buttons to stop/normalize/accelerate time
Visiting Objectives no longer has a set visit duration. You can spend as much time as you want in an objective and the more time you spend, the more valuable encounters and hashtags you will find
Cost of Living is no longer per country, but per objective
The SpacePad Location app is now generated using dynamic data. Before, all the country brochures were made by hand (don't tell anyone^^ but you know how they say - fake it till you make it!)
The usual pbug fixes and performance optimizations that every dev team likes to brag with :D
We also have new graphics for the Location app and also new flags. For the next major update we will concentrate a bit more on content, as we know it is sorely needed!
We could REALLY use your feedback!
Best!
L
Original post