Saving and loading a game in vb.net - vb.net

Question

Is there away I can save or load a game a lot more easier than I have?
Saving Code
Dim file As System.IO.StreamWriter
file = My.Computer.FileSystem.OpenTextFileWriter("c:\Pugio Cadite\CharacterInformation.txt", True)
file.WriteLine(charactername)
file.WriteLine(characterrace)
file.WriteLine(characterclass)
file.WriteLine(characterGender)
file.WriteLine(charactergold)
file.WriteLine(characterlevel)
file.Close()
and I have not yet wrote the load function.

Answer 1

Imports System.Xml.Serialization
Public Class Form1
Private Sub Button1_Click(sender As Object, e As EventArgs) Handles Button1.Click
'save the program variables
Dim p As New ProgramVars
p.Prop1 = "1"
p.Prop2 = "2"
p.Prop3 = "3"
p.Prop4 = "4"
Dim strFilename As String = "C:\Junk\Junk.xml"
p.Save(strFilename)
'load them into a different object
Dim p2 As ProgramVars = ProgramVars.Load(strFilename)
MsgBox(p2.Prop3)
End Sub
End Class
<Serializable>
Public Class ProgramVars
Property Prop1 As String
Property Prop2 As String
Property Prop3 As String
Property Prop4 As String
Sub Save(filename As String)
Using fs As New System.IO.FileStream(filename, IO.FileMode.OpenOrCreate)
Dim xs As New XmlSerializer(GetType(ProgramVars))
xs.Serialize(fs, Me)
End Using
End Sub
Shared Function Load(filename As String) As ProgramVars
Using fs As New System.IO.FileStream(filename, IO.FileMode.OpenOrCreate)
Dim xs As New XmlSerializer(GetType(ProgramVars))
Return xs.Deserialize(fs)
End Using
End Function
End Class