I have a chunk class and I want it to contain references(represented by a int identifier) to objects that are occupying certain coordinates in the chunk. Since many objects don't have collisions, the same position may be occupied by multiple objects. The chunks have 2 dimensions (x,y). Here is what I was thinking to achieve this:
public class Chunk{
public List<int>[] objPresence;
}
This would make an array of lists( in which size = chunksizeX * chunksizeY) where the index would be the flattened x,y coordinates, and the list would contain all objects on that position. ( each int in the list would be my identifier of a given object )
So to find what objects are currently in a given position I would do:
listOfObjectsOnPosition = objPresence[ flattenIndex(x,y) ];
So far so good, but now if I want to check if one specific object is in a certain position I have to iterate through the list, and I would like to be able to have O(1) access on this.
So here is the alternative using dictionary:
public class Chunk{
public Dictionary<int,byte>[] objPresence;
}
and for access, to find a certain object:
objPresence[ flattenIndex(x,y) ].ContainsKey(objToSearch)
I can also iterate through the dictionary keys if I just want to get all objects in the position.
However in this method since I am using Dictionary, and the int key is the identifier for the object, the byte value on the dictionary is wasting memory since i dont need that value for anything.
Is there a way to implement what I have here without that wasted byte, or is there another, better way to do this altogether?
Thanks!