PakRat Modern

Modern PakRat-style tool for editing the PAKFILE lump inside Source .bsp maps.

It includes:

• Native Windows GUI
• CLI for scripting and automation
• Built .exe launcher

GUI

Recommended launch options:

1. Run the compiled app:

PakRatModern.exe

2. Or run the PowerShell GUI script directly:

powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\pakrat_modern_gui.ps1

Quick workflow:

1. Open a .bsp and it loads automatically
2. Set Game Path
3. Click Scan
4. Review missing files and use Add all or Add all + Save
5. Save in place or use Save As...

Main GUI features:

• PakRat-style embedded file list with In, Name, Path, Size, Type
• Dark theme UI
• Sortable list headers
• Tree/List toggle
• Add files and folders
• Drag and drop support
• Edit internal PAK paths
• Delete selected entries
• Extract selected entries
• PAK verification
• Scan map references from BSP data
• Skip files that are already shipped in the selected game's base VPKs and gameinfo.txt search paths
• Auto-add addable missing files
• Scan summary bar: missing, addable, not found, already in PAK
• Export scan results to .txt
• Remembered game paths with path manager
• Optional .bak backup before in-place save

Scan extras

Optional extras currently checked by scan:

• maps/<mapname>.nav
• maps/<mapname>.txt
• resource/overviews/<mapname>.txt
• resource/overviews/<mapname>.dds
• resource/overviews/<mapname>_radar.dds
• materials/overviews/<mapname>.vmt
• materials/overviews/<mapname>.vtf
• materials/overviews/<mapname>_radar.vmt
• materials/overviews/<mapname>_radar.vtf

CLI

Main CLI script:

• pakrat_modern.py

PowerShell wrapper:

• pakrat_modern.ps1

The wrapper uses local Python 3 when available and falls back to WSL python3.

Examples:

powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\pakrat_modern.ps1 list C:\path\map.bsp
powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\pakrat_modern.ps1 verify C:\path\map.bsp
powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\pakrat_modern.ps1 extract C:\path\map.bsp --out C:\path\pak_out
powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\pakrat_modern.ps1 add C:\path\map.bsp C:\path\materials --base C:\path\materials --out C:\path\map_packed.bsp
powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\pakrat_modern.ps1 remove C:\path\map.bsp materials/custom/test.vmt --out C:\path\map_stripped.bsp

Build the EXE

Build script:

• build_pakrat_modern_gui.ps1
• build_release.ps1

Manual build:

powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\build_pakrat_modern_gui.ps1
powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .\build_release.ps1

Output files:

• PakRatModern.exe
• PakRatModern.exe.config

Release package:

• release\PakRatModern\
• release\PakRatModern-release.zip
• release\PakRatModern\PakRat Modern.lnk

Safety and compatibility

• Does not rebuild the whole BSP from scratch
• Updates PAKFILE and adjusted lump offsets only
• Blocks unsafe PAK resize if LUMP_GAME_LUMP is after the PAK lump
• Prevents unsafe extraction paths like ../
• Blocks unsafe Windows path characters in internal PAK paths
• Applies size and entry-count limits while reading packed ZIP data
• Supports validation before saving
• Supports optional .bak backup for in-place save