An engine that thinks.
Khora is an experimental real-time game engine written in Rust, built on a Symbiotic Adaptive Architecture (SAA). Every major subsystem is an intelligent agent that negotiates for resources in real time. A central observer — the Dynamic Context Core — watches the engine's behavior, runs a set of heuristics each tick, and trades budgets through a protocol called GORNA. The agents adapt; the work continues.
Most engines decide at compile time. Khora decides at runtime, every tick.
Modern engines are rigid. They assign fixed budgets at compile time and adapt poorly to hardware diversity. Khora replaces that with a council of intelligent, collaborating agents — automated self-optimization, strategic flexibility, goal-oriented decisions. The result is an engine that runs the same code on a workstation, a laptop on battery, and a handheld — and adapts each tick to keep the frame rate.
Active development. The foundational CLAD architecture, the CRPECS ECS, the GORNA negotiation loop, six intelligent agents (Render, Shadow, Overlay, Physics, UI, Audio), a fixed-timestep simulation with render interpolation, and an editor with play mode are operational. A large workspace test suite runs on every commit across Linux, Windows, and macOS. The roadmap commits to a multi-year horizon — culminating, in a later phase, in a native physics solver replacing the third-party backend.
git clone https://github.com/eraflo/KhoraEngine.git
cd KhoraEngine
cargo build
cargo test --workspace
cargo run -p sandbox # run the demo — a scene you can fly around
cargo run -p khora-editor # open the editorRequires Rust 1.91+ and a GPU supporting Vulkan, Metal, or DX12.
The documentation is an mdBook that routes you by what you came to do — build a game, understand the engine, or contribute. Start at the Home page and pick your path.
| Go straight to | If you want to |
|---|---|
| Home — choose your path | Get oriented and pick a track |
| Your first game | Build a running scene, step by step |
| The big idea (SAA) | Understand why the engine negotiates with itself |
| API reference (rustdoc) | Look up the exact public API |
| Roadmap | See what is committed and what is planned |
Read it locally with live reload:
mdbook serve docs/ --openThe published book and API reference live at https://eraflo.github.io/KhoraEngine/.
Khora is a Cargo workspace. Dependencies flow downward only
(khora-core → khora-data/khora-control → khora-lanes → khora-agents →
khora-infra → khora-sdk):
khora-core Trait definitions, math, GORNA types, the Runtime container
khora-macros #[derive(Component)] proc macro
khora-data CRPECS ECS, components, Flows, scene definitions
khora-control DCC orchestration, GORNA protocol, the Scheduler
khora-lanes Hot-path pipelines — render strategies, physics steps, audio mixing
khora-agents Six agents — Render, Shadow, Overlay, Physics, UI, Audio
khora-infra Default backends — wgpu, Rapier3D, CPAL, Taffy, winit (swappable)
khora-io VFS, asset loading, scene serialization
khora-telemetry TelemetryService, MetricsRegistry, monitors
khora-plugins Plugin loading and registration
khora-sdk Public API — the only surface a game depends on
khora-editor Editor application
khora-runtime Generic player binary, stamped with packed assets
Plus the tooling crates sandbox (the demo game), xtask (build automation),
and hub (the project launcher). Every backend in khora-infra implements a
trait from khora-core: wgpu, Rapier3D, CPAL, and Taffy are current defaults,
not architectural commitments — alternative backends drop in as new sibling
folders without touching the rest of the engine.
Khora ships with provider-agnostic agent instructions:
CLAUDE.md— Claude Code entryAGENTS.md— Codex / Aider / Cursor / Continue entry.github/copilot-instructions.md— GitHub Copilot entry.agent/— single source of truth: rules, conventions, architecture brief, specialist personas
- New contributors: start at the docs' Contributing section.
- Read the Code of Conduct and Contributing Guidelines.
- Join discussions on GitHub Discussions.
- File bugs or feature requests as Issues.
Khora Engine is licensed under the Apache License 2.0.