Decrypting Save Game Files: Exile 1 thru 3

[Ishad Nha]

All three of the Exile games have parts of their save files encrypted by a simple XOR method. Ormus provided a simple program to decrypt the Blades of Exile files. For Exile 2, Exile 3 and Blades of Exile the pattern is:

the party records are encrypted with a key of 92

the individual PC records are encrypted with a key of 107.

 

~~Start~End~Key

Exile 1:~<= 8~15,837~92

 

Exile 2:~<=10~38,071~92

~~54,456~63,941~107

 

Exile 3:~<= 10~34,090~92

~~50,475~61,430~107

 

Blades of Exile~6~45,913~92

~~62,298~73,685~107

 

(This forum needs provision for tab stops, in the absence of this I have changed all tabs to tildes.)

 

The start figures for the party records part of save files for Exile 1 thru Exile 3: these are only guesses, as I don't have access to the source code for these games.

 

 

[Ishad Nha]

Save game files contain the records for boats and horses. If you ever wonder where you left a boat or horse check the records:

 

(Exile 1: I simply cannot make head or tail of the records. This is not surprising because In Exile 1 you had to leave your boat before you could enter a town, which is different to later games.)

 

Exile 2 Boats: places 4,688 through 4,987.

(No Exile 2 horses existed.)

 

Exile 3 boats, places 4,848 through 5,147.

Exile 3 horses, places 27,246 through 27,545.

 

All records that I have seen so far have ten bytes for each entry: town x, town y, four places for outdoor locations, two places for town number ("200" = no town), boat/horse exists and is it anyone's property? If the boat was outdoors the town x,y might become outdoor x,y.

 

This information is spoilerific, it tells you about all boats even if you don't already know about them.

[Eldibs]

As far as character stats go, I've no idea what any of the locations are. However, for the items your characters are holding, I have somewhat extensive information for Exile 2 and 3.

 

The following locations are for Character 1, Item Slot 1, for Exile 2, with 1 as the starting location (subtract 1 if you use 0 as the starting location, obviously). For each subsequent character, add 1581 to the location. For each subsequent item slot, add 79 to the location. For example, if you wish to see item slot 3 on character 2, you'd add 1581 + (79 * 2) to the location. Unless otherwise noted, to get any use from the information stored in the locations, all you need to do is reverse the Binary XOR operation (with a key of 107).

 

54605 = The starting location of the item's identified name. Undo the XOR encryption and use the number as the ASCII code. The name goes for about 15-20 characters (I forget the exact amount)

 

54630 = Same as above, except it's for the Unidentified name of the item.

 

54591 = Stores the item's graphic. I have a mostly complete list of values somewhere, but I'll have to hunt it down.

 

54577 = Item type. Once again, I have a list of the values somewhere, but I'll have to find it.

 

54579 = Damage/Defense/Item Level. For weapons, this location affects the damage, for armor, it affects defense, and for other items (rings, potions, whatever) it affects the item level.

 

54585 = Armor Bonus/Weapon defense. For armor, it affects the bonus, for weapons, it handles the defense attribute.

 

54583 = Affects the bonus stat of Weapons. I haven't played around with this location, so I don't know if it does anything for non-weapon items.

 

54593 = The item's ability. Again, I have a list of values that I've misplaced.

 

54603 = Magicalness. If the item is Magical, this will be a 1 (after the XOR operation), if not, it will be a 0. Yes, you can remove a weapon's magicalness to enchant it more than once (for instance, a Steel Waveblade (+2)(+2)).

 

54601 = Stores whether or not the item is identified. A 1 is yes, a 0 is no.

 

54581 = Handles the item's Encumbrance.

 

54587 = Handles the amount of charges the item has. Useless if the item has no abilities, but some item abilities will let you use the item infinitely if it has 0 charges (like the Orb of Thralni). Setting arrows/darts to have zero charges, however, does not give you infinite arrows.

 

54599 and 54600 = Stores the item's value. The formula for calculating the value is a + (b * 256), where a is the value in the first location, and b is the second. So, if the values are 184 and 11 (respectively), you'd end up with an item value of 3000

 

Use this information as you will, if you want to cheat massively, don't complain to me if it ruins your fun. As soon as I get time, I'll post my info on Exile 3 (assuming I don't decide to spend said time working on my idea for an A4 character editor). It's mostly the same, just different locations. Feel free to correct me, I've been working all night (I work the overnight shift), so I may have put a wrong number or something somewhere. Also, I've no idea what happens for items with negative stats (i.e. the Imp Weapons), as I haven't messed around with that, so don't ask me.

[Ishad Nha]

Exile 3 game structure has a fair amount in common with Blades of Exile, and the latter is now open source. I posted a topic on decrypting BoE save files, in the BoE forum. Anything mysterious in an Exile 3 save file might be explained by comparing it with the known structure of the BoE saves.