Variables and serialization in Unity - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Variables and Serialization in Unity

📖 Scenario: You are creating a simple Unity game where you want to save the player's name and score so you can load it later.

🎯 Goal: Learn how to create variables and use serialization to save and load player data in Unity.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create variables to store player name and score

Use Unity's serialization to save player data

Load and display saved player data

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Saving player data is essential in games to keep progress between sessions.

💼 Career

Understanding variables and serialization is key for game developers working with Unity to manage game state and data persistence.

1

Create player data variables

Create a public class called PlayerData with two public variables: a string called playerName and an int called playerScore.

Unity

public class PlayerData {
    // Your code here
}

Need a hint?

Use public string playerName; and public int playerScore; inside the class.

2

Add serialization attribute

Add the [System.Serializable] attribute above the PlayerData class to enable Unity to serialize it.

Unity

// Add the [System.Serializable] attribute above the PlayerData class
public class PlayerData {
    public string playerName;
    public int playerScore;
}

Need a hint?

Place [System.Serializable] right before public class PlayerData.

3

Create and assign player data instance

In a new GameManager class, create a public variable called playerData of type PlayerData. Then, in the Start() method, first instantiate it with playerData = new PlayerData();, then assign playerData.playerName to "Alex" and playerData.playerScore to 100.

Unity

[System.Serializable]
public class PlayerData {
    public string playerName;
    public int playerScore;
}

public class GameManager : UnityEngine.MonoBehaviour {
    public PlayerData playerData;

    void Start() {
        // Your code here
    }
}

Need a hint?

Declare public PlayerData playerData;, instantiate with playerData = new PlayerData(); and assign values inside Start().

4

Print player data to console

In the Start() method of GameManager, add a Debug.Log statement to print the player's name and score in the format: "Player: Alex, Score: 100".

Unity

[System.Serializable]
public class PlayerData {
    public string playerName;
    public int playerScore;
}

public class GameManager : UnityEngine.MonoBehaviour {
    public PlayerData playerData;

    void Start() {
        playerData = new PlayerData();
        playerData.playerName = "Alex";
        playerData.playerScore = 100;
        // Add Debug.Log to print player data
    }
}

Need a hint?

Use Debug.Log($"Player: {playerData.playerName}, Score: {playerData.playerScore}"); inside Start().