Google has revealed the first “real build” prototype working version of its autonomous self-driving vehicle.

The new car, part of Google’s self driving car project, is the first fully functional self-driving car designed from the ground up by the company.

The vehicle offers a number of new features from a mockup previously revealed in May, although the visual aesthetics remain similar, with the exception that it now has headlights and indicators.

Google say that they’ve been working on different prototypes-of-prototypes, “each designed to test different systems of a self-driving car.” Examples given include testing typical car parts including steering and braking, as well as the self-driving parts such as the internal computer and sensors.

“We’ve now put all those systems together in this fully functional vehicle—our first complete prototype for fully autonomous driving,” the company posted.

The original mockup included no steering wheel, however Google has been forced to compromise in response to California DMV rules. “Our safety drivers will continue to oversee the vehicle for a while longer, using temporary manual controls as needed while we continue to test and learn.”

If you’ve not been following the story, the project is different to the well reported Google self-driving cars we’ve covered previously; here Google isn’t simply designing a package that can turn an existing vehicle into a self-driving car, but actually creating a autonomous self-driving car from scratch. The idea is to design a vehicle best suited to and around a self driving system.

While the car visually looks like something out of a cutesy anime comic (very kawaii!) Google is betting that autonomous vehicles are the future of mass market vehicle transportation, and they may well be on to something.