Being able to simply load Lua tables is a powerful mechanism. If you format save data as a valid Lua file, it can be loaded back as a module. Using this feature of Lua, you can avoid having to write code that parses a text file.

Let's explore this concept by first saving some data to disk. The following function saves a simple object containing a level, health, and number of lives to a file named save.lua:

function Save(level, health, lives)
    file = io.open("save.lua", "w")

    file:write("return { 
")
    file:write("	level = ", level, ",", "
")
    file:write("	health = ", health, ",", "
")
    file:write("	lives = ", lives, "
")
    file:write("}")

    file:close()
end

Save(20, 10, 2)

Because save.lua is a module, you can load the save data with a single call to require, like so:

gameData = require("save")
print("Loaded:")
print("	level: " .. gameData.level)
print("	health: " .. gameData.health)
print("	lives: " .. gameData.lives)