Are getters and setters poor design? Contradictory advice seen

Question

I'm currently working on a simple game in Java with several different modes. I've extended a main Game class to put the main logic within the other classes. Despite this, the main game class is still pretty hefty.

After taking a quick look at my code the majority of it was Getters and Setters (60%) compared to the rest that is truly needed for the logic of the game.

A couple of Google searches have claimed that Getters and Setters are evil, whilst others have claimed that they are necessary for good OO practice and great programs.

So what should I do? Which should it be? Should I be changing my Getters and Setters for my private variables, or should I stick with them?

Answer 1

• Very evil: public fields.
• Somewhat evil: Getters and setters where they're not required.
• Good: Getters and setters only where they're really required - make the type expose "larger" behaviour which happens to use its state, rather than just treating the type as a repository of state to be manipulated by other types.

It really depends on the situation though - sometimes you really do just want a dumb data object.