.KV3 File Extension
KeyValues3 Game Data File
| Developer | Valve |
| Popularity |
4.3 | 3 Votes |
What is a KV3 file?
A KV3 file is a plain text data file used by a Valve video game, such as Dota 2 or CounterStrike:Global Offensive (CS:GO). It contains text written in a structure similar to JSON. In CS:GO, KV3 files control how the game's bots behave.
More Information
KV3 stands for KeyValues3, which is a Valve-developed data format that is similar to JSON and XML. However, KV3 files also support binary encodings, versioning, and data annotations. They also include support for some additional text syntax.
Each KV3 file begins with a line that contains a kv3 encoding header. It then goes on to define how a game object behaves. For example, bt_default.kv3 is a KV3 behavior tree, which defines how CS:GO bots behave in deathmatches. Bt_default.kv3 contains references to other KV3 files, stored in CS:GO's scripts/ai/modules directory. Those KV3 files contain scripts that bots execute to perform in-game actions.
How to open a KV3 file
You can open and edit a KV3 file in any text editor or source code editor, such as Microsoft Visual Studio Code (cross-platform) or GitHub Atom (cross-platform).