Hello Kitty gets a rhythm game with ZUTOMAYO as Sanrio launches its first smartphone title

For more than seven decades, Sanrio has done something specific and commercially effective: it has placed its characters on things. Hello Kitty on a backpack. Cinnamoroll on a phone case. My Melody on a mug. The arrangement keeps the characters at a comfortable distance — objects to carry, not systems to play. Sanrio Kawaii Me Live! is the company’s first attempt to change that register.

The choice of form is telling. Sanrio did not enter interactive entertainment with a platformer or a narrative-driven experience. It chose a dance and rhythm game — a genre in which the mechanic is literally the music, where characters perform rather than decorate. In Sanrio Kawaii Me Live!, players guide Hello Kitty, Cinnamoroll, Pompompurin, My Melody and others through original songs commissioned specifically for the game, customizing outfits and stage designs along the way. The point is to put the player inside the performance rather than place them in front of it.

Hello Kitty, Kuromi, My Melody and Pompompurin as 3D characters in Sanrio Kawaii Me Live — Image: Sanrio Co., Ltd.

The soundtrack is the most revealing detail in the announcement. Sanrio has assembled original material from Soala, SHE’S, Lienel, Polkadot Stingray, Yabai T-Shirts Yasan and Mi’Line Hearts, with ZUTOMAYO now confirmed as an additional collaborator. That last name carries real weight: ZUTOMAYO is a secretive indie-rock group built around vocalist and composer ACA-Ne, a project that has spent recent years selling out Nippon Budokan and staging tours across Asia. Its presence here reads less as a brand licensing deal and more as a signal of creative intent — an early indication that Sanrio Games is trying to build something with cultural traction, not just a tie-in.

Sanrio Games, the company’s own game brand launched earlier in 2026 to connect its character IP with interactive audiences, unveiled the title at Sanrio Fes 2026 in Minatomirai. Pre-registration is live on iOS App Store and Google Play, with a milestone campaign that unlocks in-game rewards at successive thresholds — the top tier, one million combined sign-ups and social follows, awards a special Hello Kitty outfit for Mira, the game’s customizable player character. Sanrio is also planning a release celebration live event at Yokohama Kannai Hall on January 14, 2027, where the game’s collaborating artists will perform alongside Sanrio character appearances. Sanrio Kawaii Me Live! launches globally in January 2027, free-to-play with optional in-app purchases, for iOS and Android.

Sanrio has watched other studios build games around its characters for a long time. With Sanrio Kawaii Me Live!, it is building one itself — and the music it chose to anchor it suggests the company decided what kind of game it wanted to make before it opened a design document.

Tags: mobile games, Hello Kitty, rhythm games, Sanrio, Sanrio Kawaii Me Live!, ZUTOMAYO