Feedback Add a System.Object field to UnityEngine.GameObject to allow tagging with arbitrary data

Would be possible for the developers to add a System.Object field to UnityEngine.GameObject or UnityEngine.Object, so you could link them with arbitrary data?

Currently for example, I'm using a custom class for game entities (sort of an abstraction with extra code and MonoBehaviour-related things hidden underneath to make modding more controllable).

However, when I need to retrieve a physics-supported entity via custom OverlapPoint() implementation, I have to check do this:

Code (CSharp):

1. public NetEntity OverlapPoint(Vector2 inPosition, Mask inMask)
2. {
3.     Collider2D collider = this.physicsScene.OverlapPoint(inPosition, (int)inMask);
4.     if (collider != null)
5.     {
6.         var script = collider.GetComponent<BaseEntityObject>()?.script;
7.         if (script != null)
8.         {
9.             if (script is NetEntity netEntity) return netEntity;
10.             else if (script is ENT_Grid.GridBoundingBox boundingBox) return boundingBox.grid;
11.             else return null;
12.         }
13.         else return null;
14.     }
15.     else return null;
16. }

Which, however, isn't an exactly elegant solution. With being able to "tag" the GameObjects with a System.Object, I could just initialize the script and set the gameObject.Data to the script internally, which I could then access like this, skipping the unnecessary GetComponent<BaseEntityObject>() call.

Code (CSharp):

1. public NetEntity OverlapPoint(Vector2 inPosition, Mask inMask)
2. {
3.     Collider2D collider = this.physicsScene.OverlapPoint(inPosition, (int)inMask);
4.     if (collider != null)
5.     {
6.         var script = collider.gameObject.Data;
7.  
8.         if (script is NetEntity netEntity) return netEntity;
9.         else if (script is ENT_Grid.GridBoundingBox boundingBox) return boundingBox.grid;
10.         else return null;
11.     }
12.     else return null;
13. }

 

We will not be adding any additional fields to UnityEngine.GameObject nor UnityEngine.Object at this point in time.

I think you are taking the right approach with looking up the data with GetComponent.