Building from Source

Most people don't need this — grab a build from the downloads page instead. This is for building dinput8.dll yourself.

Requirements

CMake 3.25+, targeting Windows (native MSVC or a MinGW cross toolchain). The build refuses to configure for a non-Windows target.
A C++17 compiler.
The vendored dependencies, all git submodules under third_party/:

Submodule	Used for
zydis	Instruction decoding for the runtime resolver; built as a static subdirectory dependency
lua	Lua 5.4, compiled straight from `l*.c` (minus `lua.c` / `luac.c`)
sol2	Header-only C++ bindings for Lua
imgui	Manager UI, with the Win32 and OpenGL 3 backends

git clone --recurse-submodules <repo>
# or, in an existing clone:
git submodule update --init --recursive

System libraries linked: psapi, opengl32, gdi32, dwmapi, imm32.

Build

Native MSVCMinGW cross-compile

cmake -B build
cmake --build build --config Release

cmake -B build -DCMAKE_TOOLCHAIN_FILE=<mingw>.cmake
cmake --build build

Either way, the output is build/dinput8.dll — no lib prefix, matching the expected proxy name Windows looks for. Exports come from dinput8.def (/DEF: under MSVC, --kill-at plus the def file under MinGW). Drop the result next to the game's .exe.

Build x86 and x64 separately, into separate build directories — the address cache format is pinned to pointer size, and a mismatched DLL simply won't load into the game.

Project layout

src/
├── dllmain.cpp                  proxy + boot orchestration
├── mod_loader.cpp / .hpp        mod.toml discovery, ordering, SLO redirects
├── override_loader.cpp / .hpp   .bin / .namemap / .newexports
├── config.cpp / .hpp            mod.toml parser
├── loader_config.cpp / .hpp     Mods/cu3ml.toml
├── addr_cache.cpp / .hpp        Mods/cu3ml.addrlist
├── lua_host.cpp / .hpp          Lua 5.4 VM and the `ue3` bindings
├── ue3_api.cpp / .hpp           lazy engine-fn wrappers, output capture
├── ue3_resolve.cpp              layout resolution
├── ue3_layout.hpp               resolved layout structs (header-only)
├── ue3_patch.cpp / .hpp         live linker name/export appends
├── farchive_vtable.cpp / .hpp   FArchive vtable slot recovery
├── anchor.cpp / .hpp            string-anchored function location
├── disp_extract.cpp / .hpp      generic decode primitives (dx)
├── disp_extract_arch.cpp / .hpp UE3-specific decode queries (dxa)
├── asm_pat.cpp / .hpp           textual instruction-pattern matcher
├── hook.cpp / .hpp              inline hook manager
├── logs.cpp / .hpp              Mods/cu3ml.log
├── util.cpp / .hpp              paths, string conversion, Zydis predicates
└── manager/
    ├── ui.cpp / .hpp            manager window
    ├── gl_ctx.cpp / .hpp        Win32 + OpenGL 3 context
    ├── theme.cpp / .hpp         colors, fonts, widgets
    └── crt_post.cpp / .hpp      CRT post-processing pass

Sources are globbed (src/*.cpp, src/manager/*.cpp) with CONFIGURE_DEPENDS, so adding a file doesn't need a CMakeLists.txt edit — but does need a re-configure on some generators.

See Architecture for what each module is responsible for.