Google’s digital fly brain gets its own heaven after going through Beat Saber hell

Developers are using a simulated fruit fly nervous system to control video game characters, putting the digital insect through Minecraft and Beat Saber experiments before one creator offered it an endless, fruit-filled open world.

It sounds like scientists have uploaded a living creature’s brain into a computer, but that is not what happened. The experiments use the newly released MaleCNS connectome, which is essentially a wiring map of an adult male fruit fly’s brain and central nervous system.

The map contains more than 166,000 neurons and shows how they connect. According to Google, researchers used AI to combine millions of two-dimensional images into detailed 3D reconstructions of the neurons.

Now, developers are turning that biological data into video game experiments.

Developer Evan Sinclair Smith started the trend with NeuroCraft Fly, an experimental Minecraft project containing 166,700 simulated neurons and more than 25 million connections.

In a viral demonstration, activity inside the simulated network controlled the movement of a fly within Minecraft. Smith said the first version was built with help from GPT-6 Astra, the same model recently used to create a simulation within a simulation.

I’ve successfully run the full retained MaleCNS v1.0 fruit fly connectome, all 166,700 neurons, inside Minecraft, with its simulated neural activity driving a fly’s movement.V1 Currently in development. Built with the help of GPT-6 Astra.Props to the @OpenAI team and… https://t.co/wqsrsN5DFn pic.twitter.com/BN9cGvwVP1

Minecraft events including food, light, nearby creatures and attacks are converted into inputs for the neural model. Activity within selected groups of neurons then helps choose and adjust actions programmed by Smith, such as flying, grooming, feeding or escaping.