[Audit][High] maybeLaunchPendingWorld error propagates to frame exit, causing app crash on world load failure

[MichaelFisher1997]

🔍 Module Scanned\n (automated audit scan)\n\n## 📝 Summary\nThe function returns an error when world initialization fails (e.g., out of memory), but this error propagates through → → main loop, causing the entire application to crash and exit. Instead, the error should be caught, logged, the pending world cleared, and the game returned to a safe state (home screen) so the user can attempt to relaunch or adjust settings.\n\n## 📍 Location\n- File: \n- Function/Scope: calling \n\n## 🔴 Severity: High\n- Critical: Crashes, data corruption, security vulnerabilities, GPU device loss\n- High: Memory leaks, race conditions, incorrect rendering, broken features\n- Medium: Performance degradation, missing error handling, suboptimal patterns\n- Low: Code style, dead code, minor improvements\n\n## 💥 Impact\nWhen world generation or initialization fails (OOM, GPU resource exhaustion, etc.), the error bubbles up and terminates the entire application. The user sees a crash/exit instead of being returned to the main menu with an opportunity to reduce render distance or retry. This is especially problematic in automated scenarios (benchmarks, smoke tests) where the world launch failure should be recoverable rather than fatal.\n\n## 🔎 Evidence\n\n\n\n\n\n\nWhen returns an error (e.g., from failing), the return type propagates the error up through to , which then returns the error and terminates the main loop. The app crashes without cleanup, without returning to a safe screen state, and without logging the specific failure context.\n\n## 🛠️ Proposed Fix\nCatch the error in instead of propagating it, handle it gracefully:\n\n\n\nAlternatively, if the launch fails and we're in automated mode (benchmark/smoke test), the logic at lines 431-466 will trigger and exit the app cleanly rather than crashing.\n\n## ✅ Acceptance Criteria\n- [ ] World load failure in does not crash the app\n- [ ] Error is logged with context about what failed\n- [ ] is cleared on failure\n- [ ] App remains on the home screen or current screen after failure\n- [ ] Benchmark/smoke test modes still exit cleanly when appropriate\n- [ ] passes\n\n## 📚 References\n- Similar error handling pattern in (line 302-307) which catches and logs instead of propagating\n- The function (game-ui/src/screens/world.zig:77) can fail with OOM or RHI errors - these should be handled gracefully at the app level\n- Issue #723: InputSettings.saveFromMapper silently swallows errors - related pattern of error handling in game systems

[github-actions]

The audit accurately identifies the issue. Here's my analysis:

Root Cause Confirmed in src/game/app.zig:

• Line 315: maybeLaunchPendingWorld is declared as !void — WorldScreen.init at line 332 can fail with OOM/RHI errors
• Line 369: try self.maybeLaunchPendingWorld(swapchain_extent); propagates the error
• Lines 475-478: runSingleFrame is called with .catch |err| { log.log.err("Frame error: {}", .{err}); return err; } — the error terminates the main loop
• Result: application crashes/exits instead of recovering

Pattern Reference: Lines 302-307 show the correct approach — InputSettings.saveFromMapper(...).catch |err| { log.log.errWithTrace(...); } — catches, logs, and continues rather than propagating.

Proposed Fix: At line 369, change from try to a catch handler that:

1. Logs the error with context (pending seed, generator_index)
2. Clears self.pending_world_launch = null
3. Optionally shows an in-game message or returns to home screen

Scope: This is a single, focused change — the fix is localized to one call site and follows an existing pattern in the same file. Not too broad.

Verification: zig build test would cover the crash scenario if a test world load failure case existed.

Duplicates/Related: The issue references #723 (InputSettings.saveFromMapper) — same error-swallowing pattern. No duplicate open issues found.

Next Steps:

1. Change line 369 to use catch |err| instead of try
2. In the catch block: log error, clear pending_world_launch, optionally notify the user
3. Ensure smoke tests still exit cleanly (the -Dsmoke-test + -Dskip-present flags should still work)

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