Crimson Desert

C# graphical interface tool for reading, unpacking and extracting game .paz files. Contains Python scripts and examples for decryption, decompression and repackaging.

Crimson Desert Unpacker

🛠️ A toolset for browsing, extracting, decrypting and decompressing **.paz** archive files used by Crimson Desert.

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✨ Core Functions

• **Visual Browsing**: Browse PAMT archives via a visual file tree.
• **Batch Extraction**: Supports batch extraction of files and automatically completes decryption and decompression.
• **Automatic decryption**: Using the ChaCha20 algorithm for decryption, the key is automatically derived based on the file name, no external keystore is required.
• **Automatic decompression**: Decompress compressed entries using the LZ4 algorithm.
• **Python Command Line Tools**: Provides CLI scripts for unpacking and repackaging.
• **NO EXTERNAL DEPENDENCY**: All encryption and compression functions are built-in.

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📥 Downloads and Components

• **PAZ GUI**: Windows desktop application for browsing and extracting PAZ archives. Requires .NET 8 runtime environment.
• **PAZ Python Tools**: Standalone command line script for unpacking and repacking. Requires a Python 3 environment with the `cryptography` and `lz4` packages installed.

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🖥️ GUI User Guide

• Download and unzip the GUI compressed package.
• Run `PazGui.exe`.
• Open the folder containing the `.paz` archive to browse the archive contents.
• Select the file and extract - the decryption and decompression process will be handled automatically.

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🐍 Python command line usage guide

```python

List archive contents

python paz_parse.py /path/to/0.pamt --paz-dir /path/to/0003

Extract all files

python paz_unpack.py /path/to/0.pamt --paz-dir /path/to/0003 -o output/

Extract XML files only

python paz_unpack.py /path/to/0.pamt --paz-dir /path/to/0003 -o output/ --filter "*.xml"

Repackage modified files

python paz_repack.py modified.xml --pamt /path/to/0.pamt --paz-dir /path/to/0003 --entry "path/to/file.xml"

```

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🔧 How it works

PAZ archives use PAMT index files, which map file paths to byte ranges in one or more `.paz` data files. Encrypted entries (such as XML configuration files) use the ChaCha20 algorithm, where the key is deterministically derived from the file name, so no key database is required. Compressed entries use LZ4 block compression.

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⚠️Mod production restrictions

• **Repackaging Unreliable**: Due to the integrity checks the game has on metadata files (or similar files), the repackaging feature is currently highly unreliable.
• **File Size Limitation**: The modified file must fit into the size allocated by the original file, and entries cannot currently be expanded.
• **Format not fully resolved**: Mesh models and many other game objects use a custom binary format that is not fully documented at this time.

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📜 Source code

Project source code is available on GitHub. This project is licensed under the MIT license.

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💡 **Usage Suggestions**: This is a powerful tool for players and modders who want to gain a deeper understanding of Crimson Desert's file structure or perform basic data extraction. It is recommended to start with GUI tools first, and then try Python scripts for more flexible operations after becoming familiar with them.