diff --git a/buildapp/build_app_windows_x86.sh b/buildapp/build_app_windows_x86.sh
index 16fc78669..d151f0946 100755
--- a/buildapp/build_app_windows_x86.sh
+++ b/buildapp/build_app_windows_x86.sh
@@ -16,7 +16,12 @@ rm -rf $DESTDIR || true
 mkdir $DESTDIR
 
 # Prepare an application
-cp $SRCFILES/Terrarum.bat $DESTDIR/
+if ! command -v x86_64-w64-mingw32-gcc  &> /dev/null
+then
+    echo 'Mingw32 not found; please install mingw64-cross-gcc (or similar) to your system' >&2; exit 1;
+fi
+
+x86_64-w64-mingw32-gcc -o $DESTDIR/Terrarum.exe $SRCFILES/Terrarum.c || { echo 'Building EXE failed' >&2; exit 1; }
 
 # Copy over a Java runtime
 cp -r "../out/$RUNTIME" $DESTDIR/
diff --git a/buildapp/terrarumwindows_x86/Terrarum.bat b/buildapp/terrarumwindows_x86/Terrarum.bat
deleted file mode 100755
index 1eadf130b..000000000
--- a/buildapp/terrarumwindows_x86/Terrarum.bat
+++ /dev/null
@@ -1,2 +0,0 @@
-cd /D "%~dp0"
-.\runtime-windows-x86\bin\java -Xms1G -Xmx6G -jar .\assets\TerrarumBuild.jar
diff --git a/buildapp/terrarumwindows_x86/Terrarum.c b/buildapp/terrarumwindows_x86/Terrarum.c
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..a01642dee
--- /dev/null
+++ b/buildapp/terrarumwindows_x86/Terrarum.c
@@ -0,0 +1,6 @@
+#include <stdio.h>
+#include <stdlib.h>
+
+int main() {
+    return system(".\\runtime-windows-x86\\bin\\java -Xms1G -Xmx6G -jar .\\assets\\TerrarumBuild.jar");
+}
\ No newline at end of file