Where the industry is heading over the next 5 years:

1. As OS kernels integrate Hypervisor-Protected Code Integrity (HVCI) and Virtualization-Based Security (VBS) by default, ring0 software hooks will become increasingly restricted.
2. Hardware-level Direct Memory Access (PCIe FPGA cards) with custom configuration space firmware completely bypasses software-level kernel restrictions.
3. Secondary PC processing renders overlays on an isolated machine with zero software footprint on the host gaming PC.

The future belongs to hardware virtualization and isolated bus mastering.

Hardware-isolated 2-PC setups represent the ultimate physical separation of concerns. Great analysis.

Hardware DMA is where high-end development has already shifted.