Helpy native overlay adapters¶

Helpy draws its normal UI in its own process. The game-side bridge only composites the current shared texture and forwards captured input. Game actions keep using the existing RuneSchema service contract. Game overlay and Native in-game presentation default to enabled for new settings. Existing saved choices stay in use. Disable Game overlay in Settings/Quick settings for a regular window. The system tray opens desktop mode for settings and Windows file dialogs.

Renderer	Native integration	Requirements
DX11	DXGI presentation; deferred commands restore the game's context state	Windows shared-texture/fence support; SDR
DX12	DXGI presentation; verified back-buffer queue and per-buffer completion fences	SDR; queue verified through legacy or enhanced barriers
OpenGL	WGL/GDI swap; imported memory and semaphore objects; saved GL state	`EXT_memory_object_win32`, `EXT_semaphore_win32`, compatible modern context
Vulkan	Startup layer; imported D3D11 texture memory, external semaphores and present chaining	Opt-in startup enrollment, Win32 external-memory/semaphore support, a graphics/present queue, SDR

The game and Helpy must use the same GPU. Helpy reads the game's adapter identity and recreates its UI device on that adapter when needed, including when an offline window first attaches to a hybrid laptop's game. CPU item caches, settings and open-page state remain intact; GPU textures are uploaded again. Unsupported combinations show a status instead of attempting an unchecked GPU copy. Desktop presentation remains usable in windowed/borderless mode alongside any of these game renderers. Helpy does not enable an RHI that Dragonwilds does not ship.

Vulkan startup enrollment¶

Open Settings > Helpy > Display > Vulkan startup adapter. Enable the adapter for the selected runtime, then restart Dragonwilds. The startup layer must be present when Vulkan creates its device so it can enable available sharing extensions. It does not alter the app's requested device features.

The optional RuneSchema.Helpy.Vulkan.dll is a small selector. The shared copy, layer manifest and executable-to-bridge bindings live in AppData/Local/RSDragonwilds/RuneSchema/core/HELPY/vulkan/. Enrollment writes only Helpy's own manifest value under the current user's Software/Khronos/Vulkan/ImplicitLayers key. Other Vulkan layer registrations remain intact. The selector delegates to the bridge only for an enrolled exact executable path. Remove a runtime with the same button; removing the last binding unregisters Helpy's manifest. A running game's active adapter unloads on exit.

Elevated games ignore per-user Vulkan layers; use normal game launches. The development tests use process-local manifests and environment variables and do not register a system/user layer.

Bounded work and resource ownership¶

Three shared textures avoid overwriting a frame still used by the game. Producer/consumer ownership uses atomic slot reservations and completion fences.
Native presentation uses no CPU frame readback, PNG encoding or JSON frame transport. JSON is used for preparation and visibility/session changes.
Hidden native hooks pass through. App rendering and controller state reads stop while hidden. Device discovery occurs on device changes, not every frame.
Pointer movement uses the latest position once per UI frame. Native capture keeps the Windows hardware cursor visible independently of UI/game FPS and protects its shape from game cursor-hiding calls. A rendered cursor remains the fallback if Windows does not confirm visibility. Shape changes send one notification when changed; closing restores the game's cursor and display count. Click positions preserve event ordering and scale from the game client area to the render viewport. High-rate mouse/raw-input and unrelated window messages do not contend with the compositor's resource lock.
DX12 reuses a bounded pool of completed submission allocators instead of omitting the overlay when a back-buffer allocator is busy. It does not wait for GPU completion on the game's presentation thread.
While visible, composition serializes with the short resource-control lock instead of omitting a frame on contention. DXGI Present1 updates the full frame while captured, so game-only dirty rectangles cannot retain old panel or pointer pixels. Hidden frames retain the existing pass-through path.
Background opacity leaves text and controls opaque. Native status is visible directly below its switch; renderer readiness, attachment and failures also produce bounded entries in RuneSchema.log.
DX11/DX12 accept 8-bit and 10-bit SDR back buffers. Display-encoded UI pixels use UNORM target views so an sRGB view cannot brighten the theme again.
Opening failures show their reason and a usable desktop window. The first displayed frame produces one status update per opening; attachment alone is not reported as successful presentation. No per-frame status requests are used.
The game receives neutral XInput state while the panel captures input. Cursor clipping/recentering is suspended only for the attached foreground game.
Focus loss, a full input queue, or a heartbeat older than 1.5 seconds releases capture. The desktop app owns its normal close/tray/exit behavior.
Resize, swap-chain destruction, game shutdown and app replacement release bindings. GPU resources remain alive until submitted work completes.
Hook trampolines/code stay pinned for the game's lifetime so an in-flight callback cannot jump into an unloaded DLL. This is one bounded allocation, not an accumulation per opening.

Verification and limits¶

Isolated hardware tests on an NVIDIA RTX 5080 verify native pixels, premultiplied transparency, bounds, shared fences and hidden pass-through for DX11, DX12, OpenGL and Vulkan. DX11 tests also verify context state restoration. Vulkan tests exercise the real loader, startup layer, shared-surface attachment, destruction, selector delegation and non-enrolled process behavior. These fixtures do not launch Dragonwilds, change saves or register a real Vulkan layer.

Live Dragonwilds exclusive-fullscreen, AMD/Intel drivers, multiple monitors/DPI changes, other overlays and controller hardware still need acceptance testing. HDR, separate Vulkan graphics/present queues and cross-adapter sharing are not claimed. Native mode keeps secondary panels docked; authoring file dialogs use Windows and can require desktop focus.

API references: Microsoft DX12 swap chains, Khronos external memory and synchronization, OpenGL Win32 external objects, and Vulkan loader/layer interface.