The six most impressive Genie 4 worlds from day one, from a Blender simulation to GTA Waymo

Day-one experiments with Genie 4

Google DeepMind unveiled its Genie 4 world model on Oct. 27. The model turns text prompts into real-time, controllable worlds with sound, while Gemini plans each scene step by step. Only trusted testers can use it for now, so the first examples came from people with early access and from DeepMind researchers.

This ranking is an editorial selection of original recordings shared on X on Oct. 27. Each post is linked in the sources section. News accounts that reposted the official launch videos were left out. Figures are as of the morning of Oct. 28.

1. GTA Waymo

A recording by a16z partner Justine Moore tops the list. Moore shared the recording as “GTA Waymo before GTA 6” and said it was fully interactive, real-time video from Genie 4. A Waymo drives through San Francisco-style streets with a chase camera. A giant monster stomps by, a transformer explodes and the front of a multi-story building collapses. The frame counter in the recording shows the scene running at about 24 frames per second.

DeepMind has said Genie 4 scenes stay consistent for about two minutes.

Justine Moore@venturetwins

We got GTA Waymo before GTA 6

(this is fully interactive real-time video from Genie 4)

2. A kraken in a sunken ship

In her second recording, Moore built a third-person underwater adventure from a single starting prompt covering the environment and the character. A diver with a lantern moves past piles of gold and through a cave with a waterfall. According to the prompts visible in her recording, Moore added a kraken tentacle bursting through the ship’s hull, glowing electric eels and a translucent pirate captain. Moore stressed that the world comes with native audio.

Justine Moore@venturetwins

Had early access to Genie 4 from @GoogleDeepMind.

This is a fully generated, interactive world from a single starting prompt (environment + character) 🤯

Feels like a massive step forward - you can now prompt to change the world and interact with it. With native audio!

3. A robot city with dragons

Wharton professor Ethan Mollick’s first prompt was a neogothic brutalist city inhabited by robots and horses. According to Mollick, Genie 4 built the world in about a minute. He then added dragons and a friendly otter NPC. Mollick called the experience “quite an insane experience,” while noting that it isn’t flawless.

Ethan Mollick@emollick

Genie 4 is quite an insane experience, generating game-like enviornments as you go. It isn't flawless but I can type "Neogothic brutalist city inhabited by robots and horses" & it creates one in a minute. Then I asked it to add dragons. Then a friendly otter NPC. All in realtime

4. An office where everything is DOOM

In his second experiment, Mollick asked for an office where every computer and wall runs DOOM. He then typed, in turn, that a demon coworker appears, that he has a chaingun and that he gives Mollick a bonus. In the recording, each prompt is added to the scene while the world keeps running. The example shows Genie 4’s real-time steering feature.

Ethan Mollick@emollick

Genie 4 runs DOOM: "Walking through a typical office but every computer is running DOOM and all of the walls are also running DOOM and also everything is DOOM"

"My coworker who is a demon appears"

"He has a chaingun"

"He gives me a bonus"

5. Talking to his younger self

Aleksander Holynski, a researcher on the Genie 4 team and a professor at Columbia University, wrote that he has been using the model to have conversations with younger versions of himself. In the recording he shared, he chats on a campus with himself fresh out of college, with his own webcam visible in the corner. Genie 4’s new talking characters and native audio show up here in their most personal form.

Aleksander Holynski@holynski_

i’ve found myself using Genie 4 to have conversations with younger versions of myself...

here’s me talking to myself just out of college. i was pretty naive, but not a whole lot has changed :)

6. Blender in real time

Tejas Kulkarni, who works on world models at DeepMind, had Genie 4 simulate the 3D modeling program Blender. The Blender interface in his recording isn’t a real program. The model generates every frame, including the rotating bust, the switch to a wireframe view and the side panels. The example shows that a world model can imitate software interfaces as well as game scenes.

Tejas Kulkarni@tejasdkulkarni

Simulating Blender in real time with Genie 4!