moonwell-client-core/README.md

<div align="center">
  <h1>benilla</h1>
  <p><b>A complete World of Warcraft 1.12.1 client, written from scratch in Rust and <a href="https://bevy.org">Bevy</a></b></p>
  <p>
    <a href="https://discord.gg/wJSJx467G4"><img src="https://img.shields.io/discord/1529280129518538922?style=for-the-badge&logo=discord&logoColor=white&label=discord&color=5865F2" alt="Discord"></a>
    <a href="https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdCnpZNKxyb8"><img src="https://img.shields.io/badge/devlog-youtube-FF0000?style=for-the-badge&logo=youtube&logoColor=white" alt="YouTube devlog"></a>
    <a href="LICENSE-MIT"><img src="https://img.shields.io/badge/license-MIT%20%2F%20Apache--2.0-blue?style=for-the-badge" alt="License"></a>
  </p>
</div>

benilla plays the whole game: character creation, questing and professions, dungeons and raids,
battlegrounds and honor, groups, guilds, trade, mail and the auction house, on the stock 1.12
interface and with your addons. It connects to a 1.12.1 server over the original protocol and
reads the game's data from your own 1.12.1 install. Every file format, the network protocol and
the interface engine are written from scratch, with no original client code, no third-party WoW
crates and no bundled game assets.

What the real client does is read at its bytes in
[benilla-re](https://github.com/samwhosung/benilla-re), the reverse engineering benilla is built
against, by the same client addresses the comments here cite.

## What's inside

- **Formats:** readers for the whole asset stack (the MPQ patch chain, BLP, DBC, ADT, WDT, WDL, M2
  and WMO), wired into Bevy as an asset source.
- **World:** terrain streamed out to the horizon, portal-culled buildings with interior lighting,
  doodads and ground clutter, swimmable water, sky and weather, and the client's own day/night
  lighting, fog and gamma.
- **Models:** GPU-skinned M2s with the full animation controller, particles, ribbons and the spell
  visuals, and characters end to end: customization, the armor composite, weapons with their
  enchant glows, forms, stealth and mounts.
- **Movement:** networked movement in both directions, the server-granted modes from slow fall to
  roots, a follow camera with collision, boats, zeppelins and taxi flights.
- **Networking:** SRP6 auth through world-session crypto and the object mirror into the ECS,
  covering the game from movement and chat through combat, spells, groups and raids, quests,
  trade, mail, the auction house and battlegrounds.
- **Interface:** a FrameXML and Lua engine that runs the stock 1.12 interface off your install's
  patch chain, and third-party 1.12 addons: Questie, pfUI, Bagnon, Bartender2 and most others
  run. By choice, the options window and the ESC menu follow the Classic Era client's rather than
  1.12's.
- **Audio:** music, ambience and effects under the client's own selection and crossfade rules,
  with interior and underwater transitions and zone reverb.

The format readers and the UI engine core are plain Rust with no Bevy in them, and the world
renderer runs with no game attached. [`docs/MAP.md`](docs/MAP.md) maps every crate and subsystem,
and [`docs/DEVIATIONS.md`](docs/DEVIATIONS.md) lists everywhere benilla differs from 1.12.1; both are
generated from the code.

## Status

Complete and fully playable. What is left:

- The long tail of small features that separates a working client from a finished one, tracked
  as [issues](https://github.com/samwhosung/benilla/issues).
- Addons, options and performance, ongoing.

benilla is a faithful 1.12.1 client and the foundation people build on. There are no prebuilt
downloads: a packaged build, a particular server's changes or anything 1.12.1 never had belongs
in a fork, and forks are welcome. GitHub lists
[every public fork](https://github.com/samwhosung/benilla/forks).

Not planned: other expansions or client versions, Warden (anticheat).

## Running it

benilla builds and runs on macOS, Linux and Windows. You need:

- **A 1.12.1 client (build 5875)** for the game data, in any locale. benilla only reads it, and
  shows its text in the client's language; development runs on English clients.
- **A 1.12.1 server.** [vmangos](https://github.com/vmangos/core) is what development runs
  against; cMaNGOS and the other 1.12.1 cores speak the same protocol. benilla does not answer
  Warden, so a server that enforces it disconnects the session after its timeout; vmangos ships
  with Warden off.
- **Stable Rust and a C compiler**, which some dependencies build with: on macOS the
  Xcode command line tools, on Linux the ALSA and udev development packages and pkg-config, on
  Windows the MSVC build tools that the Rust installer sets up.

This fork also reads community **ruRU language packs for 1.12.1** from `Data/ruRU`.
Keep the base MPQs in `Data` and the Russian `patch-*.MPQ` files in that subfolder;
`WOW_DATA` points to `Data`, not to `ruRU`. An installed pack selects Russian automatically.
`WOW_LOCALE=ruRU` requires the pack, `WOW_LOCALE=enUS` selects the English base chain, and
`WOW_LOCALE=auto` restores automatic selection. Restart the client after changing the language.
The selected chain supplies DBC names, interface strings, fonts, textures and audio; missing
localized files fall back to the base chain. Benilla's own settings and menu captions also have
Russian translations. The login sends the selected locale to the server; server-supplied quest,
NPC and item text requires translations on that server. Packs for later expansions are unsupported.
`moonwell-deploy stage` preserves an installed `ruRU` archive folder in the distribution.

```sh
WOW_DATA=/path/to/WoW/Data cargo run --release -p benilla
```

On Windows, in PowerShell:

```powershell
$env:WOW_DATA="C:\path\to\WoW\Data"; cargo run --release -p benilla
```

Each release is a tag on the [Releases page](https://github.com/samwhosung/benilla/releases):
`git checkout <tag>` first runs that release, and `main` is the development tip.

`WOW_DATA` names the install's `Data` folder; a link to the install named `WoW` at the repo root
does the same (`ln -s /path/to/WoW WoW`, or on Windows a junction, which needs no admin rights:
`New-Item -ItemType Junction -Path WoW -Target C:\path\to\WoW`). The server defaults to
`localhost:3724`, the stock auth port. Point `WOW_HOST` at another (`WOW_HOST=play.example.com`, or
`play.example.com:5000` for a remapped port), or set it from the Realmlist button on the login
screen, which remembers it. Credentials go in at the login screen, or set `WOW_USER` and `WOW_PASS`
to skip it.

Settings, screenshots and addons live in `benilla-config/` at the repo root: a 1.12 addon goes in
`benilla-config/AddOns/`. [`docs/CONTRIBUTING.md`](docs/CONTRIBUTING.md) has the rest, from the
player build to the tests.

## Contributing

Issues and pull requests are open. [`docs/CONTRIBUTING.md`](docs/CONTRIBUTING.md) says where to
start, what gets in, how a change is judged and what happens to a pull request once it is open.
Bugs, questions and ideas are welcome on the [Discord](https://discord.gg/wJSJx467G4) too.

---

Early inspiration and file format guidance came from the
[wowemulation-dev](https://github.com/wowemulation-dev) community, and
[warcraft-rs](https://github.com/wowemulation-dev/warcraft-rs) in particular.

benilla is an independent fan project, not affiliated with or endorsed by Blizzard Entertainment.
It ships **no Blizzard content**: no art, models, sounds, maps, MPQ contents or FrameXML. You
provide your own legally obtained 1.12.1 client, and the stock interface runs off its FrameXML at
runtime. The few files under `crates/benilla-app/assets/ui/` are our own, not copies of it:
adapters over stock files, and the settings windows and script error log benilla draws itself.

World of Warcraft is a trademark of Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. Our own code is licensed under
[MIT](LICENSE-MIT) or [Apache 2.0](LICENSE-APACHE), at your option. The kira audio engine under
`third_party/` is vendored under the same two licenses, with its author's copyright notices beside it.