HouraiConfig

A Unity3D system for effectively authoring and editing global game configurations without use of singletons.

Usage

Defining Configuration Types

Configuration files are simply ScriptableObjects in Unity. Define any type deriving from ScriptableObject. Editable fields follow the same serialization rules as normal Unity objects. By convention, these configuration files should generally not have methods and should be just pure data types.

public class DebugConfig : ScriptableObject {

  public bool ShowHitboxes = false;

}

Creating Configuration Files

It is advised to use the CreateAssetMenuAttribute attribute provided by Unity to easily add menu items for creating config files. By convention, these are usually found under Config/<General Grouping/<Config Type>.

[CreateAssetMenu(menuName = "Config/Examples/Debug Config")]
public class DebugConfig : ScriptableObject {
  ...
}

Registering Configurations

Registering loaded configs with the config registry can be done with the Config.Register static method.

For convienence, a ConfigLoader MonoBehaviour script is provided to simplify use. In the editor, it allows designers to add multiple configurations to be loaded on startup. Note: the config loader only loads the configurations and can safely be destroyed after loading is complete.

Note: This step is optional as the system will automatically create configs with the default values if other code attempts to load a config that has not been registered yet.

DebugConfig debugConfig = MethodToLoadDebugConfig();
Config.Register(debugConfig);

Retrieving Configurations

To retrieve a loaded configuration, use the Config.Get<T> static method. This returns the stored configuration for a given type.

This has a few key caveats that must be kept in mind when retrieving configs:

• Config.Get<T> will never fail. Even if there is no currently registered config for that type.
• If no config is registered, a new config is created with ScriptableObject.Create<T> with the default values for the config type.
• No copies of the configuration are ever made. The same instance will be returned on each call to Get<T> so long as a new instance is not registered. Mutating that instance will change the config values for all subsequent calls to Get<T>.

DebugConfig debugConfig = Config.Get<DebugConfig>();
if (debugConfig.ShowHitboxes) {
 ...
}

Clearing All Configurations

To clear out all of the loaded configurations in the Config registry, use the Config.Clear() static method.

This does not destroy any of the stored configurations. If the ScriptableObjects were dynamically loaded, they must be cleaned up seperately.

This is generally not advisable to call in a normal context, but can be used to reset the state of the registry for contexts like unit tests.