I’m using SKIF v0.7.1.1 with Global Injection enabled. When I launch DRAGON QUEST BUILDERS 2 JUMBO DEMO, I can see the initial SK in-game UI appear and I can use it while the Square Enix and Omega Force logos are on screen. As soon as the opening movie starts to play, the in-game UI disappears. SK still appears to be doing it’s thing (I’m now getting smooth, high framerate) and I can trigger the in-game UI with the keyboard combo or gamepad combo (input is going to the SK in-game UI), but I can’t see it in order to properly adjust anything during gameplay. Anything I can do to fix this? Thanks! 
It’s possible it’s detecting the graphics API wrong. The game uses D3D11 and D3D9.
Can you provide a copy of:
Documents\My Mods\SpecialK\Profiles\DRAGON QUEST BUILDERS 2 JUMBO DEMO\logs\SpecialK.log?
Also, the version of SKIF has nothing to do with this. SKIF is just a little GUI.
That’s the important version number.
Thanks for the reply! I appreciate all the info and help. SpecialK is an invaluable tool and you’re the best for not only building it, but supporting it with the community, too. 
I’m using SpecialK64.dll version 0.11.0.48 according to what I see displayed in SKIF:
Attached is SpecialK.log from Documents\My Mods\SpecialK\Profiles\DRAGON QUEST BUILDERS 2 JUMBO DEMO\logs.
SpecialK.log (114.5 KB)
If there’s any other info I can provide to help track this down, let me know. Thanks again!
Wow, Unreal is going nuts trying to figure out your resolution 
I actually put a ton of work into dealing with Unreal Engine resolution issues in just the past couple of days, so this may solve the problem.
0.11.0.49 Pre-Release (64-bit) (7.6 MB)
Stop Global Injection, then replace SpecialK64.dll with this and start Global Injection back up.
Thanks for the super quick reply!
I tried out SpecialK64.dll version 0.11.0.49 using the file you provided:
Unfortunately, I had the same results upon launching the game again. A new copy of SpecialK.log from Documents\My Mods\SpecialK\Profiles\DRAGON QUEST BUILDERS 2 JUMBO DEMO\logs is attached.
SpecialK.log (111.8 KB)
For what it’s worth, I’ve seen some very strange behavior with this game around resolution switching between 1080p and 1440p. My display is 1440p native, so that’s what I have set in the configuration utility that comes with the game and in the in-game settings as well. However, that setting doesn’t always seem to stick as sometimes the game will launch in 1080p instead. I’m not sure what’s causing that or if it’s related.
Anyways, thanks again and let me know if I can send any other info that’s useful.
There is definitely something unusual about your system.
You will need to manually disable D3D9 hooks in SpecialK.ini,
[API.Hook]
d3d9=false
d3d9ex=false
logs/Modules.log might help shed some light on this weird behavior.
I made the changes to the [API.Hook] section under Documents\My Mods\SpecialK\Profiles\DRAGON QUEST BUILDERS 2 JUMBO DEMO\SpecialK.ini and that did the trick! I can now access the SK in-game UI as intended. Thank you! 
I’ve attached modules.log from Documents\My Mods\SpecialK\Profiles\DRAGON QUEST BUILDERS 2 JUMBO DEMO\logs below in case it can help figure out what might be causing weirdness.
modules.log (22.4 KB)
Thanks again!
FYI, I think the underlying problem here is actually the Steam Overlay.
Hopefully when I release 0.11.0.49 it will eliminate this problem without requiring you to turn off D3D9.
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Are you supposed to be able to hook special K into any game? Because a while back when it was on steam, aemony tried some attempts at helping special k show the GUI in Brawlhalla (free to play game on steam) tried a lot of options and he never managed to make it show / properly hook itself.
Brawlhalla is an adobe air game, air version 17 and it uses DX9. It renders with a mode called DIRECT which means compositing is done by the CPU but the rendering is done by the GPU. I was never able to make the GUI show myself either, but I was able to have some of the features work such as mouse cursor lock.
It’s unfortunate because special k would save the game from AIR (flash) being absolutely terrible. I’ve heard some other guys were able to translate D3D9 to D3D11 and make it work in other games, but as far as I remember these were all the options Aemony tried! https://i.imgur.com/5uDINrs.png
Eitherway, just asking if there’s any such thing of this game managing to have special k work or if it would need for a newer version of AIR that supports DX11
Where stuff goes way off course is the discussion of GDI.
Special K has never, and almost certainly never will, supported GDI because it’s 1) ancient Windows 3.1 era stuff and 2) not a gaming-centric graphics API. If the game is doing something that requires GDI compatibility, it is profoundly broken in my opinion.
I do not think any version of Special K is ever going to be suited to that game, unfortunately. It is doing things that game engines should not.
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The screenshot you linked to is very curious, could you actually point me to the thread where that originated?
Yes, of course I can, bad etiquette of me to not link the post with the image, https://steamcommunity.com/app/1157970/discussions/1/2577697791644155857/
Here’s the deal however; if I do disable DWM, it’ll swap presentmode to:
Hardware: Legacy copy to front buffer
You gave me an idea, I wonder if that would make it possibly work. AIR is unfortunately an outdated relic, but Brawlhalla is not. Game has over 100k concurrent users across all platforms… but the devs are unable to do anything about AIR’s terrible limitations except maybe jump ship to a new “engine”
AIR was never designed to be optimal later down the road, it’s just bad. Programs like Special K might be the best possible fix if compatible. So yeah, I’ll try attempting to hook special k by disabling DWM as that forces the game to present the render completely differently than copy with gpu gdi.
I mean my entire main frustration with the game is the fact that it can’t bypass DWM due to having no way of going fullscreen exclusive (or a proper flip model for borderless) it causes framepacing issues, terrible latency and more and essentially makes it so that the higher refresh rate you go, the less lag you’ll have as I did a bit of my own presentmon research on latency of the game at different HZ (keep in mind, these numbers are not 100% accurate and simply close estimates, DWM v-blank is not a constant here like I present, it’s just for easier view) ;
