Crimson Desert Controller Remapper

Remap your gamepad controls in Crimson Desert. The game has no built-in controller remapping — this tool patches the input bindings directly.

Instead of cryptic button swaps, you see actual game actions (Sprint, Dodge, Jump) and assign them to the buttons you want. Auto-swap ensures no two actions share a button.

Features

• Action-based remapping — see game actions, not raw button IDs
• Three context tabs — Combat (16 actions), Menus (8), Horse (7)
• Auto-swap — reassigning an action automatically moves the displaced action
• Xbox controller diagram — real controller image with interactive hotspot overlays
• Leader-line labels — action names in columns outside the controller, connected by lines to their buttons
• Interactive hover & selection — hover highlights labels and buttons in blue; swapped buttons stay gold until applied
• Built-in presets — Soulslike, Southpaw, Trigger Swap
• Custom profiles — save and load your own layouts
• Progress bar — real-time progress during Apply/Undo (no more GUI freeze)
• Button tooltips — hover any bottom-bar button to see what it does
• Remembers your mappings — reopens with your last-applied remap
• Safe — backs up vanilla files before patching; undo restores originals
• Rollback on failure — if patching fails mid-write, all files are automatically restored from backup
• Backup safety — backups are bound to the game directory they were created for; prevents cross-install restore mistakes
• Profile validation — saved profiles are validated on load; rejects corrupted or malformed button assignments
• Context collision detection — detects conflicting remaps between Combat and Horse tabs before applying

Quick Start

1. Download cd_remap.exe from Releases
2. Windows SmartScreen warning: The exe is not code-signed, so Windows will block it. To unblock: right-click cd_remap.exe → Properties → check Unblock at the bottom → OK. Then run it normally.
3. Pick a preset or click actions to remap them
4. Click Apply — a progress bar shows while game files are patched
5. Launch Crimson Desert

To undo: reopen the tool and click Undo All.

Built-in Presets

Preset	What it does
Soulslike	Sprint on B, Dodge on A, Jump on Y, Kick on X
Southpaw	Swaps stick clicks and bumpers
Trigger Swap	Swaps triggers and bumpers

Running from Source

Requires Python 3.12+, Dear PyGui, XInput-Python, and lz4.

git clone https://github.com/Pachacutie/cd-controller-remapper.git
cd cd-controller-remapper
pip install -r requirements.txt
set PYTHONPATH=tools
python -m cd_remap

The tool auto-detects your Steam install. If it can't find the game, pass --game-dir:

python -m cd_remap --game-dir "D:\Steam\steamapps\common\Crimson Desert"

CLI

cd_remap                          # Launch GUI (default)
cd_remap --tui                    # Text-based UI
cd_remap apply config.json        # Apply from JSON config
cd_remap remove                   # Restore vanilla bindings
cd_remap show                     # List current gamepad bindings
cd_remap interactive              # Launch TUI (legacy alias)

Building the exe

pip install pyinstaller
python build/build_exe.py
# Output: dist/cd_remap.exe

How It Works

Crimson Desert has a two-layer input system. inputmap_common.xml provides baseline bindings (menus, HUD), while inputmap.xml overrides combat and character action bindings. Both live inside encrypted PAZ archive 0012. The tool patches both files:

1. Backs up the vanilla PAZ files, PAMT index, and PAPGT hash registry
2. Extracts and decrypts both XMLs (ChaCha20 + LZ4)
3. Swaps GamePad Key= values based on your assignments
4. Re-compresses, re-encrypts, and patches both XMLs back into the PAZ archive
5. Updates the PAMT index and PAPGT integrity hashes

Undo restores all files from backup.

Tests

pip install pytest
python -m pytest tests/ -v    # 131 tests

License

MIT