💾 Play Save Mode — Unity 6 Editor Plugin

Preserve component values modified during Play Mode. No more losing tweaks when you press Stop.

---

The Problem

Unity discards all component changes made during Play Mode the moment you press Stop. This forces a tedious loop of:

1. Enter Play Mode → tweak values → mentally note them
2. Exit Play Mode → re-enter the values by hand
3. Repeat until it feels right

Play Save Mode breaks that loop entirely.

---

Features

• Save Now — snapshot a component's current values at any moment during play
• Save When Exiting — track a component and capture its final state when you press Stop
• Always Save — register a component once; it auto-saves every single play session
• Editor Window — Tools > Play Save Mode shows all registered components, their status, and lets you apply or clear saves manually
• Hierarchy Indicator — an orange icon appears next to any GameObject with pending saves; click it to jump straight to the window
• Undo support — all applied changes are wrapped in a single Undo group (Ctrl+Z to revert)
• Auto scene save — the scene is saved automatically after changes are applied
• No dependencies — four plain C# files, no packages, no Asset Store

---

Installation

1. Copy the four files into your project under Assets/Editor/PlaySaveMode/:

Assets/
└── Editor/
    └── PlaySaveMode/
        ├── PlaySaveModeManager.cs
        ├── PlaySaveModeMenuItems.cs
        ├── PlaySaveModeWindow.cs
        └── PlaySaveModeHierarchyIndicator.cs

2. Unity will recompile automatically. No further setup required.

⚠️ All files must live inside an Editor/ folder. Unity will throw compile errors if they are placed in a runtime-compiled folder.

---

Usage

Save Now

Snapshot the component's values at this exact moment.

1. Enter Play Mode
2. Modify any component values in the Inspector
3. Right-click the component header (or click ⋮) → Play Save Mode > Save Now
4. Press Stop — values are applied automatically

Save When Exiting Play Mode

Track a component and save its final state when you stop.

1. Enter Play Mode
2. Right-click the component header → Play Save Mode > Save When Exiting Play Mode
3. Keep tweaking freely — the latest state at the moment you press Stop is saved

Always Save When Exiting Play Mode

Set-and-forget. Works across all future play sessions.

1. Right-click the component header (in any mode) → Play Save Mode > Always Save When Exiting Play Mode
2. A ✓ checkmark confirms it's active
3. Click again to un-register

---

Editor Window

Open via Tools → Play Save Mode

Area	Description
Status banner	Green in Play Mode, grey in Edit Mode
Pending Saves list	Shows GameObject name, component type, and always badge
Ping button	Highlights and selects the object in the Hierarchy
Remove button	Drops a component from the queue without touching the scene
Apply All Changes	Applies all pending saves (Edit Mode only)
Clear All	Removes all registrations with a confirmation prompt

The window is fully dockable — drag it next to your Inspector for a permanent view while playtesting.

---

Hierarchy Indicator

An orange icon appears at the right edge of any row in the Hierarchy that has at least one pending save.

• Updates live every 500ms during Play Mode
• Clicking the icon opens the Play Save Mode window directly
• Disappears automatically after changes are applied or cleared

---

Limitations

• Serializable fields only — saves [SerializeField] and public fields. Private non-serialized fields are not captured.
• Scene objects only — Project-window prefabs are not targeted.
• EditorJsonUtility based — nested references to other scene objects serialized as instance IDs may not resolve correctly across domain reloads.

---

File Overview

File	Responsibility
PlaySaveModeManager.cs	Snapshot storage, serialization, apply-on-exit logic, Undo
PlaySaveModeMenuItems.cs	Right-click / ⋮ context menu entries on every component
PlaySaveModeWindow.cs	Dockable Editor Window (Tools > Play Save Mode)
PlaySaveModeHierarchyIndicator.cs	Orange indicator icon in the Hierarchy window

---

License

MIT — free to use, modify, and distribute.