Data directory

The data subdirectory of your Castle Game Engine project is somewhat special. For typical games (that are distributed with read-only data files) it is recommended to put all your data inside the data subdirectory, and load them using a special URL protocol castle-data:/xxx.

Advantages:

1. This directory is automatically correctly packaged by the CGE build tool and editor. E.g. it will be correctly added to the Android apk file, iOS or Nintendo Switch application.

2. It is detected in a smart way. E.g. it allows to place your data files in a system-wide location on Unix.

3. It can be customized using the ApplicationDataOverride global variable.

Note that you do not have to place your files inside the data subdirectory, or use the ApplicationData function or castle-data:/xxx URLs, if you don't want to. You can always load a file from any filename or URL, so you can open any file on disk etc. However, using data subdirectory is adviced for typical cross-platform games. This way the build tool will automatically package your game correctly.

Example things to put in the data subdirectory:

• Game 3D and 2D models, loaded e.g. by

  MyScene.Load('castle-data:/my_model.x3d')

  See loading 3D and 2D models in viewports.

• 2D images, loaded e.g. by

  MyImageControl.Url := 'castle-data:/my_image.png'

  See displaying images.

• Sounds, loaded e.g. by

  MySoundBuffer := SoundEngine.LoadBuffer('castle-data:/my_sound.wav')

  See loading sounds.

• ... and really anything else you plan to load during the game. Your custom files can be loaded using

  MyStream := Download('castle-data:/my_binary_file')

  or

  MyTextReader := TTextReader.Create('castle-data:/my_text_file.txt')

  See loading from URLs and the CastleDownload unit.

Note that the data contents should be treated as read-only in cross-platform applications. In some cases it may be writeable (e.g. on desktop, when the application files are owned by the current user) but on some platforms it may be read-only (e.g. in case of Android, it resides in a special area which cannot be modified by code).