How to edit .pak files?

[Dead Moroz]

How can I edit (and maybe extract) .pak files? What programs do I need?

Sorry, if it was mentioned before. But I could not find the answer on Org.

[Sinner]

So far I don't think anybody has discovered a tool for extracting/creating the .pak files in the demo. The existing tools for Quake, etc all report that the RTW demo files are not valid pak archives, so I suspect that either it's a very obscure pak format or CA invented their own.

You can however edit the file using a standard hex editor, although some can be quite cumbersome to use for the editing required. I initially used my old hex editor, XVI32, but I found that for me Vedit better suited the part-hex, part-text nature of the pak files. You do have to pay for Vedit, but there is a 30-day trial download you can check out. Hopefully the full release of RTW won't use pak files, so there'll be no need for me to buy Vedit.

[Azmogeddon]

Hi just a quick post to point you in the direction of Easymod which at least allows you to edit battles (units, deployment, factions, the lot) outside of the pak, no hex editors - just using notepad. No restrictions on number of bytes either, so you're free to add in as much as you want (within the hard-coded game limits 20 units per faction, 120 or so soldiers per unit). I wrote a 2vs2 (Carthage & Gaul vs Julii & Senate) in just over 5 minutes.

You can find it at this thread on ORG or for more information go to this thread on TWC.

[Dead Moroz]

Thanks, men!

I hardly can understand anything in huge mix of hex and words showing in Vedit. Hope these files won't be packed in release.