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BSide: Olivia Lin Shows miHoYo Moving Beyond Games Again
miHoYo has quietly listed BSide: Olivia Lin on Steam, revealing a new AI companion-style application that is very different from the company’s usual games. The studio, known globally through HoYoverse for Genshin Impact, Honkai: Star Rail and Zenless Zone Zero, has become one of the biggest names in live-service gaming.
However, this latest offering suggests miHoYo is still looking beyond traditional game development, this time through a more experimental app built around music, emotional expression and desktop presence. On Steam, BSide: Olivia Lin is listed as an application rather than a game, and is currently marked as coming soon, with Free to Play, Utilities, Early Access, Music and Relaxing tags attached.
Olivia Lin Is Built Around Music And Memory
BSide: Olivia Lin centres on Lin Li, also known as Olivia, a Shanghai girl who majors in piano and minors in psychology. The character is described as someone who loves vinyl records, old films and rainy days, while working on a personal study about music and memory.
One of its main features is the ability to experience Olivia’s piano performances. Users can also upload MIDI files, with the app generating music videos from them and turning personal creations into something more visual. That makes BSide: Olivia Lin feel less like a simple AI chatbot and more like a creative companion app. The focus appears to be on mood, music and personal interaction, rather than quests, gacha systems or combat loops.
Letters And Live Wallpaper Add To The Companion Feel
Another major feature lets users write letters to Olivia. Users can express their current feelings in text and exchange stories with her. The app also includes live wallpaper functionality, allowing Olivia to remain on the desktop and begin performances directly from there.
That desktop layer is important to the app’s identity. BSide: Olivia Lin is not just something users open for a quick conversation, but something designed to sit in the background of a daily PC setup. At the moment, the app appears to be primarily built for Chinese-speaking users, with Simplified Chinese listed for the interface, full audio and subtitles, and no English-language support listed.
miHoYo’s AI Experiment Is Still In Early Access
BSide: Olivia Lin is still in Early Access, which means miHoYo is likely treating this as an evolving project rather than a finished release. That also makes it difficult to know how far the company intends to take the app. There is no detailed public roadmap yet, and miHoYo has not announced whether the application will eventually receive broader language support or a wider international push.
Still, the Steam listing is interesting because of what it suggests about miHoYo’s ambitions. The company already has some of the biggest anime-style game franchises in the world, but BSide: Olivia Lin points towards a different kind of character-driven experience, one that mixes AI interaction, music tools and desktop companionship.
For now, BSide: Olivia Lin remains a curious project to watch rather than a major global launch. It is not another Genshin Impact or Honkai: Star Rail, but that may be exactly why it stands out.
