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The profile for Burnout Paradise contains all saved progression, including event completion, collectible discovery, records, and unlocked vehicles, among other things. It also contains user-selected data such as vehicle colors, options, and custom online race routes.

The only major content not saved in the profile is mugshot data, which is stored independently. Its location is platform-specific.

Overview

TODO: Describe some common stuff here. High-level overviews of components saved: vehicles, records, progression, etc.

Known issues and exploits

Buffer overread via color indices

Colors and color types may be modified by changing the selected index on a given vehicle. As there is no bounds checking in place, it is possible to read data beyond the selected color type and the PlayerCarColours resource altogether. What's read in is interpreted as floating-point data representing percentages of 255, leading to values less than 0% and greater than 100%. The resulting colors often glow and have been dubbed "neon" colors. The exact process by which these colors are formed is currently unknown and likely requires shader research to understand.

TODO: Add picture of a neon car

Replacement of selected liveries with other vehicles

The selected livery of a given vehicle is stored as a vehicle ID. As there are no checks in place to ensure the selected vehicle is a child of the given vehicle, this can be replaced with any other vehicle, including undrivable vehicles such as traffic. Liveries set this way cannot be selected normally in the junkyard but can be used by other means, such as waiting for the countdown to end in an online race or having the host of an online room start a Marked Man game.

TODO: Add a picture of an unselectable traffic car

Time and distance limitations

Time played, measured in seconds, was originally stored as a float. Due to the imprecision inherent to the float datatype, the smallest increments at which a value can increase get larger with bigger values. In this case, time stopped increasing when it could no longer increment by the frametime (16.6 ms), which limited the value to just 262144 seconds (72.8 hours).

Distance travelled suffers the same imprecision woes but at a later point. While it is still added to every frame, the increase changes based on speed, so the limit changes based on speed as well: 10425 mi at 67-134 mph, 20850 mi at 134-268 mph, and 41700 mi at 268-537 mph, to name some common ones. These limits apply to both total and per-car mileage.

In version 1.3, time played was fixed by creating a structure specifically to address the issue:

CgsSystem::Time
Offset	Length	Type	Name	Description	Comments
0x0	0x4	int32_t	miSeconds	Seconds
0x4	0x4	float32_t	mfFraction	Milliseconds

Unfortunately, this fix was only applied to time, meaning distance remains limited even in the latest versions of the game.

Layout

Headers and protection

Each platform has its own container and/or file header. The profile itself has no header and nothing in place to prevent modification; however, per-platform protections are in place. This section will give a rough overview of these protections but is not intended to be a guide to defeating them.

Original

PlayStation 3

The profile has no header on the PS3, making it the most straightforward to edit in its decrypted form. Saves on PS3 are encrypted, but tools such as Bruteforce Save Data render that irrelevant.

Xbox 360

Xbox 360 profiles use EA's proprietary MC02 header to protect the data. Following any edits, the profile must be rehashed using a program such as MC02 Package Tool. It is also contained in the standard format used on Xbox 360 and can be accessed with a tool such as Velocity.

PC

The PC profile uses the Rich Game Header (RGMH), which affords no protection from modding. The profile is located at %LOCALAPPDATA%/Criterion Games/Burnout Paradise/Save/Profile.BurnoutParadiseSave.

Remastered

PlayStation 4

The PS4 profile is similar to the PS3 profile in that it has no header. Per-platform protection, on the other hand, is greatly improved; it is not possible to modify saves without the use of a jailbroken PS4 except through the paid software Save Wizard, which only allows all events to be found and all vehicles to be unlocked. Any PS4 running firmware 9.00 or below can be jailbroken, meaning any saves from that firmware or below can be decrypted. Jailbroken PS4s may access the profile via Apollo Save Tool. Alternatively, one could use PS4 Save Mounter and an FTP connection, assuming the account is PSN activated.

Xbox One

The Xbox One is the only console on this list to not have been exploited; thus, its saves cannot be modified and the structure of the profile is unknown.

PC

Like with the PC version of the original game, the Remastered profile uses the Rich Game Header and has no protection from modding. It is located at %LOCALAPPDATA%/Criterion Games/Burnout Paradise Remastered/Save/Profile.BurnoutParadiseSave.

Switch

TODO: I'm not familiar with Switch saves, someone else might have to do this section. Burninrubber0 (talk) 23:13, 18 February 2022 (UTC)

ProfileStoredData

This is the primary profile structure which holds all data.

TODO: Create structures for other platforms/versions, including for development builds. (Perhaps make a dedicated section for each profile iteration?)

PlayStation 3

Offset	Length	Type	Name	Description
0x0	0x1DA30	Profile	mProgressionProfile	Profile 1.0
0x1DA30	0x7540	LiveRevengeProfile	mLiveRevengeProfile	Live Revenge Profile
0x24F70	0x7370	OptionsDataProfile	mOptionsDataProfile	Options Data Profile 1.0
0x2C2E0	0xAC0			Profile 1.3
0x2CDA0	0x18			Options Data Profile 1.3
0x2CDB8	0x19C8			Profile 1.4
0x2E780	0x1C60			Profile 1.7
0x303E0	0x268			Profile 1.8
0x30648	0x10A8			Profile 1.9
0x316F0	0xE910	char[59664]	macPadData	Padding

Profile 1.0

Progression Profile
Information on the Progression Profile and the layout of the Profile structure.

Live Revenge Profile

Live Revenge Profile
Information on the Live Revenge Profile and the layout of the LiveRevengeProfile structure.

Options Data Profile 1.0

Options Data Profile
Information on the Options Data Profile and the layout of the OptionsDataProfile structure.

Profile 1.3

TODO

Options Data Profile 1.3

TODO

Profile 1.4

TODO

Recent Players

TODO

Profile 1.7

TODO

Profile 1.8

TODO

Profile 1.9

TODO