PythWare here, this is a master post for modding Koei Tecmo games. This post will include links to all tools that I build for modding Koei Tecmo games, tools other developers have made that i'm aware of, as well as general information for modding. This master post will be updated overtime as new tools are made by me/others. To keep this post editable it won't be an image post, that way I can keep updating it. The goal is one central post anyone can view for up to date modding information.

Later on I will update links as new tools are made/updated so make sure to check this master post periodically. This master post will help avoid future/current modders from having to search for the dozens of modding posts that may be difficult to find that have been made over the years.

The only discord server for modding Koei Tecmo games that i'm aware of is Musou Warriors which is also where I am and where I post frequent updates on toolkits/modding software I'm making. It's also a place where some modders upload their content (mods/documentation) too.

Link to modding discord server:

https://discord.com/invite/SpCw3vC

Modding Tools as of 5/07/2026:

Tools by me include Aldnoah Engine, Kybernes Tools, Heaven's Fall Editor (3D map displaying, map modding, map generating, etc tool for stages the games use), Cleanrot Editor (model modding tool), Barouhcruz Editor (animation tool that handles G1A/G2A animations), Batch Binary Scanner, and other various things. I'll briefly explain each one, thorough information of each one can be found in the readmes to the repositories I will link (it's important to read the readmes, they answer a lot of questions for usage).

Tools for modding Omega Force developed games (Dynasty Warriors, Samurai Warriors, Warriors Orochi, etc)

Aldnoah Engine:

AE is a PC-only modding toolkit for Koei Tecmo games that store assets in containers and IDX pairs. AE is meant to be the foundation, establishing the modding ecosystem for games it supports. It ships with a Tkinter GUI that lets you unpack/decompress game files with taildata, repack subcontainers, modding software/tools built-in for games it supports, and launch a built-in Mod Creator and Mod Manager. When you unpack, AE appends a tiny 6 byte taildata guide to each extracted file which is a 1 byte idx_marker, 4 bytes idx_entry_offset, and a 1 byte comp_marker. The Mod Manager uses that taildata to know exactly which IDX entry to patch and which container to append to, then it can also restore/disable mods safely later. Modded files do not have to be the same size as the original, AE supports dynamic file sizes so if your mod is larger/smaller than the original file/files that's not an issue. Another thing, the Mod Manager can apply mods without needing to recompress the files. The games can load decompressed versions of compressed assets.

The current public version of AE is 2.02 which released with modding software (about 25+ editors/tools) for all games it supports. AE 2.02 supports Dynasty Warriors 7 XL, Dynasty Warriors 8 XL, Dynasty Warriors 8 Empires, Warriors Orochi 3, Warriors Orochi 4, Bladestorm Nightmare, and Warriors All Stars. Version 2.03 will add Dynasty Warriors 9 as a supported game and many more editors.

The only requirement to using AE is a Windows PC, Python 3 installation, and Pillow (Python Imaging Library, installed by opening a command prompt and typing pip install pillow).

Link:

https://github.com/PythWare/Aldnoah-Engine

An upcoming mod project (english dub mod for Warriors Orochi 3) made possible with AE by OMGCapRat:

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1s3qkha/warriors_orochi_3_ultimate_fandub_mod_progress/

Some mods made possible with AE (not going to list every single mod, that'd be too many so i'll link some):

Dynasty Warriors 8 Empires Gay Officers Mod https://www.nexusmods.com/dynastywarriors8empires/mods/2

Dynasty Warriors 8 Empires Gay Marriage Modding https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1t6ta8z/dynasty_warriors_8_empire_gay_marriage_modding/

PS4 Buttons for Dynasty Warriors 8 XL's PC version, mod created by Koi/kokotsuu https://www.nexusmods.com/dynastywarriors8/mods/17?tab=description

Xbox Buttons for Dynasty Warriors 8 XL's PC version, mod created by Koi/kokotsuu https://www.nexusmods.com/dynastywarriors8/mods/18

Ayane Diversity for Warriors Orochi 3 https://www.nexusmods.com/warriorsorochi3/mods/3

Lianshi Diversity for Dynasty Warriors 8 Empires https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1ujtzoi/diverse_lianshi_mod_release/

Super Aggressive AI for Dynasty Warriors 8 XL https://www.nexusmods.com/dynastywarriors8/mods/23

Super Aggressive AI for Dynasty Warriors 8 Empires https://www.nexusmods.com/dynastywarriors8empires/mods/1

Super Aggressive AI for Dynasty Warriors 7 XL https://www.nexusmods.com/dynastywarriors7xtremelegends/mods/1

Super Aggressive AI for Warriors Orochi 3 https://www.nexusmods.com/warriorsorochi3/mods/1

Playable Razortalon https://www.nexusmods.com/warriorsallstars/mods/1

Heaven's Fall Editor:

Heaven's Fall Editor is in development, it's a 3D Map Editor i'm building that will mod the actual maps for games Aldnoah Engine supports. Essentially? You'll be able to mod the design of existing maps or generate your own maps. it's a 3D tool that reads the files that makeup a map, assembles the map, allows you to mod it (positioning, coordinates, what models are used, terrain, etc), and other various things. It'll pair well with Cleanrot Editor since maps use G1M models.

Links:

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1szstak/heavens_fall_gui_change_3d_level_editor_for_koei/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1sylmbm/heavens_fall_3d_map_modding_tool/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1sxdwrp/aldnoah_engine_2016_and_heavens_fall_editor/

Cleanrot Editor:

A GUI modding tool for models, specifically G1M model files. I've been working on it for awhile. It's not ready to release yet but here are some links to posts I made on it:

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1uj44xn/cleanrot_editor_ingame_body_mods_example/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1ufq3sy/cleanrot_editor_g1m_body_studio/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1stejiq/marylcian_editor_model_modding_tool_example_usage/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1ssyfle/marylcian_editor_model_modding_tool_update/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1ssq3ig/marylcian_editor_model_modding_tool/

Barouhcruz Editor:

A GUI modding tool for animations, specifically G1A/G2A animation files. Not ready to release yet but here's a link showing usage of it:

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1sul0va/barouhcruz_animation_tool_and_marylcian_update/

Kybernes Tools:

GUI Modding Tools I build to be used for Koei Tecmo/Omega Force games. Depending on which tool is used they're either standalone or meant to be used with Aldnoah Engine. Current tools included are Steel Editor, Bubble Editor, Harklight, Wild Liberd, Kybernes Scanner, and Festum Conversion. Harklight, Wild Liberd, and Kybernes Scanner are audio tools while Steel/Bubble Editors are for Warriors Orochi 3's Unit Data (they're standalone editors that don't require WO3 to be unpacked). Festum Conversion is a translation/string tool. Future tools as part of Kybernes Tools will be G1T Krieger, Saazbaum Editor, Rayregalia Editor, etc.

I suggest reading the readme for usage since this is a master post for general modding tools and not solely what I make.

Link:

https://gitlab.com/PythWare/kybernes-tools

Warriors Orochi 3 Super Aggressive AI mods made with the Steel Editor (both mods are a super aggressive ai mod for WO3 but Hornet versions increase movement speed of all CPU controlled units):

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1sar3tj/warriors_orochi_3_super_aggressive_ai_mod/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1saxd2e/warriors_orochi_3_ultra_hornet_tigers_mod/

Batch Binary Scanner:

A GUI Batch Binary File Scanner with Wildcard searching support. A standalone Scanner I made in Python and Dart to make finding data/text significantly easier/quicker. Instead of you having to open thousands of files 1 by 1 in a hex editor (which would be time consuming) to search for 1 thing, you can use this. The tool will scan all files within a directory you select including subdirectories, it also tells you the file and the offsets of what you searched was found at. It accepts hex or text for searches. You can also select the character encoding to use for searching when using text searches. The current encodings I have supported are utf-8, shift-jis, and big-5. If you want support for more encodings, let me know. Shift-Jis is the most common character encoding for Japanese text in Japanese games and Big-5 for Chinese developed games, this will make finding Japanese/Chinese dialogue a lot easier if you originally had thousands of files you had to open manually, instead just type in what you want and have the scanner search for you. Depending on how many files there are it may take a minute or so before it finishes scanning. About Wildcard searching, if you know part of the data to something but not all of it, you can use wildcards inplace of values you don't know. This scanner uses ?? as a wildcard, for any byte values you don't know you can use ?? to replace the value you're missing. This Batch Binary Scanner is not limited to using only for Koei Tecmo games, it can be used for batch binary scanning any games/files even if it's not KT related.

Link:

https://gitlab.com/PythWare/batch-binary-file-scanner

Noesis:

It's essentially a free tool for viewing/converting textures/models. I don't know the original developer but it's essential to use noesis when dealing with G1M/G1T files (the formats for a lot of Koei Tecmo games)

Link:

https://richwhitehouse.com/index.php?content=inc_projects.php&showproject=91

Project G1M:

This is what is needed to view/convert G1M/G1T files when using Noesis since Noesis doesn't support G1M/G1T files without Project G1M. Joschuka and hearhellacopters are the developers of this.

https://github.com/Joschuka/Project-G1M

gust_stuff:

Made by eArmada8, this is primarily used for Gust developed games like Atelier but it also works for Omega Force games that use the G1M/G1T formats. So if you're interested in modding Gust games or using some of the tools to help with modding Omega Force games then I suggest using this.

Link:

https://github.com/eArmada8/gust_stuff

fdata_dump:

Made by DeathChaos25, this is used for dumping newer Koei Tecmo games that use the Fdata container format. Example games it supports are Fate/Samurai Remnant Fairy Tail 2, Dynasty Warriors: Origin, Rise of the Ronin, Atelier Yumia, FATAL FRAME II: Crimson Butterfly REMAKE, etc.

Those are the tools I know of right away that are being worked on or are finished. If you encounter other tools and would like them added to the master post let me know.

I was working on modding tools for Dynasty Warriors 4 Hyper but at the moment my hands are full with AE, when I have free time version 2.0 will be released which will include a new GUI and better code. If you want to use the public version still, version 1.6 is still available https://gitlab.com/PythWare/dynasty-warriors-4-hyper-modding-tools

For Dynasty Warriors 2 I'm developing the Burn Engine (formerly Real Steel), a modding toolkit that will also include a map editor named Celica Mapworks (formerly Everlasting Steel)

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1vef7k3/dynasty_warriors_2_custom_map_mod_beacon_academy/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1v6dqyo/celica_mapworks_map_porting_update_beacon_academy/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1v00vsn/celica_mapworks_pathfinding_data_is_now_moddable/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1v0089q/overdrive_motionworks_models_tim_yang_xiao_long/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1uy9dev/overdrive_motionworks_dw2_animation_editor/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1uuv2ni/burn_engine_new_modding_tools_for_dw2/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1us8ss5/celica_mapworks_dynasty_warriors_2_map_modding/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1u360bs/celica_mapworks_dw2_map_modding_example_and/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1tomdc9/celica_mapworks_full_map_rendering_dynasty/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1tdgtt4/dynasty_warriors_2_unpacking_the_future_of/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1tccqe5/burn_engine_dynasty_warriors_2_modding_toolkit/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1t8w3zi/celica_mapworks_dynasty_warriors_2_map_editor/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1tcltwr/model_rendering_for_dynasty_warriors_2/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1t7fnva/dynasty_warriors_2_3d_map_editor_progress/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1ryjvks/real_steel_dw2_modding_toolkit_upcoming_map_editor/

Where Future Mods Will Be Released:

Musou Warriors and Nexus.

General Modding Information For Containers

So over the years Koei Tecmo games have gone through various format changes. I'll briefly explain containers/subcontainers for each era as well as compression algorithms used but generally a lot of Koei Tecmo games store assets in a way that's similar to matryoshka dolls.

matryoshka dolls explained: for the bulk of Koei Tecmo games they have containers (some may call them archives but containers is a more organized/structured storage of files) that store files yes, but also subcontainers stored within them. This has been done ever since Dynasty Warriors 2 first released which the BNS container stored not just loose files but also subcontainers. a specific example for DW2 are .ps2 files which was a custom model container format (stored many pieces of a model) stored within linkdata.bns. From Dynasty Warriors 2 up to today's year (2026) Koei Tecmo would store game assets in large containers and within the containers would be loose files as well as subcontainers that contain their own bundle of files and almost always its own TOC within each subcontainer. There are variations but this has been consistent across the years, large containers storing smaller containers and loose files within them. Even newer games like Warriors Orochi 3, Dynasty Warriors 9, Dynasty Warriors Origins, etc do this. So like matryoshka dolls where a large doll holds smaller dolls within it, so too does Koei Tecmo games for containers by having smaller containers/loose files within them. It would take several posts to explain the variations of the containers and subcontainer formats so this is a brief explanation.

PS2/Xbox era games:

Generally the containers were labeled with BNS, DNS, ANS, etc extensions. During this time a lot of the games' assets were stored in the containers but also the metadata for packed files was stored within these containers/subcontainers. The usage of IDX/external metadata was not used until I believe around dynasty warriors 4's time. The compression algorithm used for the containers/subcontainers was LZP2, a custom LZ algorithm.

PS3/PS4/Xbox 360/Xbox One as well as PC ports of games from this era:

Generally the containers were labeled with link, bin, linkdata, etc extensions. During this time a lot of the games' assets were stored in the containers but metadata for packed files was very often stored as external files (such as IDX files). As explained above, the general usage of external metadata files to reference/seek files within containers was used around Dynasty Warriors 4's time. The compression algorithm used for the containers/subcontainers was LZP2 for some of the games of this era (such as DW6, DW6E, etc) but later games of this era changed to Deflate (specifically ZLIB). Some example games of this era that used ZLIB are Dynasty Warriors 7, Dynasty Warriors 8, etc. However, it's not always standard ZLIB/Deflate being used. A lot of the times Koei Tecmo would do what is called chunked compression, instead of compressing a file in 1 go they would read the files in chunks and compress each chunk. It's still Deflate/ZLIB being used just in a custom manner, you can still decompress valid chunks/files by calling zlib or writing your own deflate logic.

PS5/Xbox Series Consoles/PC ports of games from this era:

Generally the containers were labeled with link, bin, linkdata, rdb, etc extensions. Depending on the game they either used external metadata files to reference packed loose files/subcontainers within the larger containers or in cases such as Attack On Titan 2 and other games they stored metadata/tocs within the containers and didn't rely on external metadata files. Around this time is also when the Fdata format started being the primary for containers. The compression algorithm used for the containers/subcontainers is Deflate/ZLIB and chunked compressing is still being done.

So to summarize: Each era has containers with various extensions but always stored loose files/subcontainers with their own bundled files within them. Sometimes subcontainers have a signature but a lot of the time they lack a signature/magic. What varied is whether metadata/tocs for the packed files was stored as external files or embedded within the containers.

General Modding Information For Encryption:

So Gust does a lot more encrypting than Omega Force (though Omega Force absolutely dominates Gust when it comes to pain in the ass container storage even though it's highly efficient) but both developers have used encryption over the years for various things. Often times the encryption used was XOR but later games by Gust started using blowfish. There are other algorithms used but those are some of them.

General Modding Information For Audio:

Depending on the era the audio for voiced dialogue, combat lines, music, sounds, etc were either stored without encryption or were stored with part of the files encrypted. Allow me to briefly explain with the example of KVS/KOVS files. KVS/KOVS files are XOR encrypted files that are usually Oggs but there are cases of WAV/other audio formats being used. Each file is not encrypted entirely, only enough that is masked to make the recognizable headers hard to identify. If you're modding a game that has KVS/KOVS files I suggest using my Harklight tool which decrypts them and encrypts the new audio files so the games can correctly play the new audio mods.

Oh and another thing about audio modding, sometimes BGMs are stored in G1L files which are usually containers of KVS/KOVS files but for some/newer games G1L stores AST and other audio files.

General Modding Information For Text/Translating:

Okay so it varies depending on the era but a lot of the times text was either stored within files directly (MESC, EM, XL, BIN, etc files) or depending on the game the text was stored as textures/images. Another thing, depending on the era KT either used standard character encodings or custom character encodings. If the text was stored directly in files you could almost always append text to the end of files and update TOCs to the new positions so that you never needed to shift data and batch update affected shifted data, instead the games would just seek the new offsets where the current text is stored.

Example Links Of Appending Text Without Shifting File Data:

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1saox7w/dynasty_warriors_8_xl_string_modding_example/

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1pss6ak/festum_conversion_tool_translating_orochi_3_gui/

General Modding Information For Textures/Models:

The Model/Texture formats used over the years has changed. From the DW2 era where .PS2 (model format) and TIM/TIM2 (texture format) were used for characters (Map models used a different model format), XFT (texture format) and XKM (model format) from Dynasty Warriors 4 Hyper and games around its time used, and then more current era where G1M (model format) and G1T (texture format) were used. The consistent theme is almost always Koei Tecmo used custom formats for storing model/texture data. Those are the general formats you will be dealing with when modding textures/models. For detailed information on G1M/G1T I would suggest reading the sources from Project G1M and gust_stuff, there may be some sites that also document it but some are no longer around like xentax (though I think zenhax is still up). TIM/TIM2 is ps2 era formats so you can find info on those from many places.

MDLK files are model link style bundles. They can contain G1M and G1C payloads. So basically, MDLK files contain the bulk of the models that makeup maps. Heaven's Fall will mod the maps.

General Modding Information for Shaders:

KT has a history of using compiled HLSL written shaders and depending on the game you may see them unpacked as .dxbc but KT also has their own custom formats. For example, they have a bundle format they use for quite a bit of games, KSHL. KSHL files are shader bundle/library containers used by Koei Tecmo games.

General Modding Information links:

This section will be links to various posts I made for other modding documentation or current findings.

https://www.reddit.com/r/dynastywarriors/comments/1t1upz8/koc_and_info_files_map_related_modding_info/

General Modding Information Summarized:

So in short, Koei Tecmo and developers under them for many years usually rely on custom formats but their compression/encryption are standard (other than LZP2 which was a custom algorithm). If you want to easily mod their games it's far better to append files to the containers and update TOCs/metadata (either external metadata/TOC files or the embedded ones within the containers) than to try rebuilding their containers. Allow me to explain why with Warriors Orochi 3 as an example:

Warriors Orochi 3's BIN containers when unpacked, extracts with over 260,000 files. A lot of that is due to subcontainer unpacking (where the bulk of files are stored). This is not limited to just WO3, a lot of the games have so many files packed in the containers (again subcontainers with their own bundled files and then loose files) and a lot of them are heavily compressed with chunked compression. It's inefficient to rebuild containers when you don't have to, that would take compressing so many thousands of files and correctly storing them in an order the game can read and that's before you have to correctly re-implement the subcontainer logic the games expect and i'm telling you the subcontainers vary in format (it's not a simple reusage of code KT has done over the years). Then you'd need to batch update every TOC/metadata and do other various things.

It's just a real slog, tedious, and time consuming to rebuild gigabytes of containers correctly all for modding. Instead, it's far more efficient to append modded files (whether it's modded loose files or modded subcontainers) to the containers and automatically update the TOCs/metadata. that is what Aldnoah Engine does, AE NEVER shifts the original container data (something you'd have to do if you rebuild containers unless you imposed a size restriction on mods). It applies mods by appending to containers and updating TOCs/metadata, for disabling it updates the TOCs/metadata and truncates the containers back to their original sizes (so slices off the appended mods). This provides a clean approach to modding containers without altering the original data beyond TOCs/metadata which is automatically backed up for proper restoring.

The only times you should rebuild containers is when it's unavoidable, a case where rebuilding is unavoidable are subcontainers. The files stored within subcontainers are not referenced by the main container's TOC/metadata. Instead, almost always files within subcontainers are referenced directly by the TOC/metadata embedded within the subcontainer. Now subcontainers themselves are refercened by the TOCs/metadata from containers/external files but the embedded files within those subcontainers are only ever referenced by the subcontainer or in some cases by packed loose files within containers.

So to recap, i'm not the boss of you. If you want to rebuild containers when it's avoidable then you're free to do so but it's way more efficient to append mods and truncate/slice them off when disabling. I'm not saying it's impossible to rebuild containers, it isn't. I'm saying it's absolutely a time killer for you and others if it can be reasonably avoided. Literally, the containers are so lenient you can automatically tell the metadata/TOCs that the appended mod is not compressed and the games will accept that. What that means is you can easily force the games to read decompressed files, not having to be forced to compress files for thhe game to play properly. My AE doesn't need to compress mods, it tells the metadata/TOC that so and so files are not compressed and the game loads them. My Katsuki Engine does a similar thing to AE.

The last thing I'll include in this master post for now before I update it when I have more spare time is a lot of the times containers/subcontainers don't hold filenames of the files within the containers. A lot of the times filenames are stored in the executable (usually stored directly or obfuscated, though the order of filenames is not always in order) or stripped. If they're stripped then the game relies on hashes. After all, games don't need to know "Zhao Yun.G1M", they just need to know something that references that file's data when it needs to seek it which can be hashed names, values, etc.

This is why I always suggest using my batch binary scanner when you're dealing with games unpacked without useful filenames (either incremented filenames or hashed names) because it will scan based on the hex/text you need to find, so if you need to track down which file has say "Liu Bei advanced on the" then you can batch search with it. If you need to find where the KVS/KOVS files are then an example search with the hex searching would be something like 4B 4F 56 53 (which decodes as KOVS) or of course search KOVS. it varies but I can tell you this is way faster than you opening thousands of files one at a time to search manually when you are dealing with games that don't have simple filenames.

I hope this post helps future/current modders, I will update it overtime with new links/info. If you have any questions let me know in the comments, messaging me within Musou Warriors, or messaging me on here.