palworld-save-tools 0.24.0
Tools for converting Palworld .sav files to JSON and back
Requires Python: >=3.9

# palworld-save-tools
Tools for converting Palworld .sav files to JSON and back.

This tool currently supports additional parsing of the following data in the `Level.sav` not handled by `uesave` or other non-Palworld aware Unreal save editors, emcompassing almost all known data structures as of Palworld v0.1.4.0:

1. `GroupSaveDataMap`
    - Groups such as in-game organizations and guilds
1. `CharacterSaveParameterMap`
    - Characters such as players and pals
1. `MapObjectSaveData`
1. `ItemContainerSaveData`
1. `CharacterContainerSaveData`
1. `DynamicItemSaveData`
1. `FoliageGridSaveDataMap`
1. `BaseCampSaveData`
1. `WorkSaveData`

## Instructions

> [!IMPORTANT]
> Converting `Level.sav` files to JSON will result in very large files, and may require significant amounts of RAM to process. Use a modern text editor such as Visual Studio Code or a Jetbrains IDE to open these files.

### Prerequisites

1. Python 3.9 or newer.
    - Windows users: You can install [Python 3.12 from the Microsoft Store](https://apps.microsoft.com/detail/9NCVDN91XZQP) or from [python.org](https://www.python.org/)

### Windows GUI steps

1. Download the latest release from [https://github.com/cheahjs/palworld-save-tools/releases/latest].
1. Unzip the file into a folder.
1. Drag and drop your `.sav` file (for Steam on Windows, these are located at `%LOCALAPPDATA%\Pal\Saved\SaveGames\<SteamID>\<SaveID>`) onto `convert.cmd` to convert the file into JSON.
1. To convert the `.sav.json` file back into a `.sav` file, drag and drop your `.sav.json` file onto `convert.cmd`.

> [!NOTE]
> In the event that the `convert.cmd` fails to function correctly, try to disable Python's app execution aliases ("Manage app execution aliases"), or failing that, please use the [Terminal](#terminal) instructions below

### Terminal

1. Download the latest release from [https://github.com/cheahjs/palworld-save-tools/releases/latest].
1. Unzip the file into a folder.
1. Open a terminal in the folder you just unzipped.
1. Depending on how Python is installed, the next steps should use either `python`, `python3`, or `py`.
1. Run `python convert.py <path to .sav file>` to convert the `.sav` file to a `.sav.json` file.
1. Run `python convert.py <path to .json file>` to convert the `.sav.json` file to a `.sav` file.

> [!NOTE]
> On Windows, you can drag and drop the `convert.py` file and the `.sav`/`.sav.json` file to avoid typing out the path.

Additional command line arguments:

1. `--to-json`: Force SAV to JSON conversion regardless of file extension
1. `--from-json`: Force JSON to SAV conversion regardless of file extension
1. `--output`: Override the default output path
1. `--minify-json`: Minify output JSON to help speed up processing by other tools consuming JSON
1. `--force`: Overwrite output files if they exist without prompting
1. `--custom-properties`: Comma-separated list of paths from [paltypes.py](./palworld_save_tools/paltypes.py) to decode.
This can be used to ignore processing of types that are not of interest.
For example `--custom-properties .worldSaveData.GroupSaveDataMap,.worldSaveData.CharacterSaveParameterMap.Value.RawData` will only parse guild data and character data.

## Developers

This library is available on PyPi, and can be installed with

```shell
pip install palworld-save-tools
```

> [!NOTE]
> Due to ongoing rapid development and the potential for breaking changes, the recommendation is to pin to a specific version, and take updates as necessary.

## Roadmap

- [ ] Parse all known blobs of data
- [ ] Optimize CPU and memory usage

## Development philosophy

- No additional dependencies. Scripts should run with a default install of Python. Distributing binary builds of Python is laden with AV false positives.
    - Optional dependencies are allowed, for example switching out the stdlib's JSON library for something more performant.
- Correctness of the conversion process is more important than performance. SAV > JSON > SAV should yield bit-for-bit identical files (pre-compression).

## Projects that make use of palworld-save-tools

> [!NOTE]
> This does not serve as an endorsement of any of these projects, use at your own risk.

- [xNul/palworld-host-save-fix](https://github.com/xNul/palworld-host-save-fix/) - Migrating save data between player IDs (eg, converting coop saves to dedicated server saves)
- [PalEdit](https://github.com/EternalWraith/PalEdit) - GUI for editing Pals
- [palworld-server-tool](https://github.com/zaigie/palworld-server-tool) - Managing dedicated servers via RCON and SAV file parsing
- [palworld-server-toolkit](https://github.com/magicbear/palworld-server-toolkit) - Assorted set of SAV file manipulations