Save
Save and load

- Martin
- 4 min read

Save
For some reason I didn’t want to work on this right away, in fact I was afraid that this would be a difficult thing. But since I had already made some test scenes it was easier to save the game. And of course load it.
For this I created a class in engine3, namely serialization.lua, this is a wrapper around binser.
This makes it possible to save object data correctly.
In the game I then created a state.lua class that looks something like this.
function State:saveEntities()
for _, entity in pairs(entityManager.entities) do
if entity.saveEntity then
entity:saveEntity()
end
end
end
---@param file string Where to save the data
function State:save(file, force)
-- Check if it is possible to save right now
if action:isProcessWorking() and force ~= true then
print("saving is not possible now, a action is still working")
return false
end
local data = {}
-- Create a save state for all entities that are needed
self:saveEntities()
-- We don't need all session data.
-- @warning keep this up to date if you want to add something
local sessionData = session:getData()
local validSessionKeyNamePatterns = {
"^actor-.*",
"^item-.*",
"^animation-.*",
"^scene-.*",
"action",
"^entity_delete",
"^entity_properties",
"^currentSceneUkey"
}
for sessionKeyName, sessionValue in pairs(sessionData) do
-- I don't know how to create multi patterns ... [x|y] don't work
local check = false
for _, pattern in pairs(validSessionKeyNamePatterns) do
if string.match(sessionKeyName, pattern) ~= nil then
if self.config.log.state then
print("[SESSION.SET." .. sessionKeyName .. "]")
end
data[sessionKeyName] = sessionValue
check = true
break
end
end
if check == false and self.config.log.state then
print("[SESSION.INFO." .. sessionKeyName .. "] don't match any save pattern")
end
end
local success, message = love.filesystem.write(file, Serialization.serialize(data))
if success == false then
error("Cannot save data, " .. message)
end
end
---@param file string What file data to load
function State:load(file)
local data = love.filesystem.read(file)
if data then
local results, len = Serialization.deserialize(data)
-- at the moment we only use one object in each file
if len == 1 then
-- set the session data
session:setData(results[1])
end
end
end
Usage
In each entity class, two functions can now be created (optionally) that are used during saving and loading of the game. Below you see a concise example of the characters entity. The advantage of this approach is that you can go in all directions in the future, but also that the files are very small.
-- special function that will execute when saving the game
function Actor:saveEntity()
-- maybe a extend class did create some data
local data = session:get("actor-" .. self.ukey) or {}
data.sceneUkey = self.sceneUkey
data.lastMove = self.lastMove
data.movableByUserInput = self.movableByUserInput
if self.activeFrameset then
data.startPositionX = self.activeFrameset:getX()
data.startPositionY = self.activeFrameset:getY()
end
-- maybe the actor did change the frameset (using a hat)
data.frameset = {}
for index, frameset in pairs(self.frameset) do
data.frameset[index] = frameset.name
end
session:set("actor-" .. self.ukey, data)
end
function Actor:loadEntity()
local restoreData = session:get("actor-" .. self.ukey)
if restoreData == nil then
return
end
if restoreData.sceneUkey ~= nil then
self:setSceneUkey(restoreData.sceneUkey)
end
if restoreData.movableByUserInput ~= nil then
self:setMovableByUserInput(restoreData.movableByUserInput)
end
-- maybe the actor did change the frameset (using a hat)
if restoreData.frameset then
for index, framesetName in pairs(restoreData.frameset) do
self:setFrameset(index, framesetName)
end
end
if restoreData.startPositionX and restoreData.startPositionY then
self.movable.vPosition.x = restoreData.startPositionX
self.movable.vPosition.y = restoreData.startPositionY
self:setXY(self.movable.vPosition.x, self.movable.vPosition.y)
end
if restoreData.lastMove then
-- what will be the new activeFrameset (index)
self:setActiveFrameset(restoreData.lastMove)
end
-- when load scene is used, we don't set the player position
-- @warning we do this after setXY, because that function will show the player
local currentSceneUkey = session:get("currentSceneUkey")
if currentSceneUkey and self.sceneUkey ~= currentSceneUkey then
self:hide()
end
end
Finally
As you can see, you only need to make sure that you save the data that you actually need. All other data is redundant and makes debugging almost impossible. Don’t wait too long with such a system, since you will have to make it anyway.
The code above is currently controlled by a button, with a screenshot of the game and the chosen character saying that the save was successful.
self.buttonSave.callbackAfterMousePressedEvent["btnSave"] = function(button)
local currentTime = os.time()
local saveGameName = "savegame" .. currentTime .. ".data"
local saveGameScreenshot = "screenshot" .. currentTime .. ".png"
-- create a screenshot without the state menu (write it to the save directory (love default))
love.graphics.captureScreenshot(saveGameScreenshot)
-- save the game
State():save(saveGameName)
-- say that the save the game was correct
local activeActor = entityManager:find({ movableByUserInput = true }, "Player")
if #activeActor == 1 then
local actionSay = ActionSay()
actionSay:execute(
{
action = action.SAY,
initiator = activeActor[1]
},
{
text = i18n:s("Save game done!")
},
nil,
{},
{},
nil
)
end
self.buttonLoad:setIsVisible(true)
return { preventDefault = true }
end
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