Chapter 11. Controlling Gameplay via Data Tables

Not all games are small, sometimes games are gigantic, and full of information, details, and most importantly, numbers. Let us imagine an RPG game, where you have to run, kill enemies, and collect stuff. Enemies could have different attributes, such as damage, powers, effect, health, and lots more. While the collected items might vary even more, where a collectable X could increase your health by 2%, another collectable Y could increase your health by 50%.

And that's the whole point behind data tables. It is a place where you can store data in a very organized way that is very friendly with the designer, and could be changed at any time, without the need to change the code. At the same time, the code can read it easily, regardless of any changes.

Data tables started for just a few specific types of games, such as Tower Defense or RPG, but very quickly it became an industry standard, and is used with all types of games, at least to store the...