Unexpected character encountered while parsing value:

Question

I'm trying to use Steam's Web API to receive JSON and parse it using JSON.Net. I'm simply hard-coding a URL where I know I'll receive JSON. I'm running into the following error when I run it though:

Unexpected character encountered while parsing value: . Path '', line 0, position 0.

The error points to line 22 of my controller:

Line 22: SteamResponse response = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject(json);

Here are my classes:

public class Game
{
    public int appid { get; set; }
    public int playtime_forever { get; set; }
    public int? playtime_2weeks { get; set; }
}

public class SteamResponse
{
    public int game_count { get; set; }
    public List<Game> games { get; set; }
}

public class RootObject
{
    public SteamResponse response { get; set; }
}

My controller looks like this:

        List<Game> gameList = new List<Game>();

        WebClient wc = new WebClient();

        var json = wc.DownloadString("http://api.steampowered.com/IPlayerService/GetOwnedGames/v0001/?key=" + steamAPIKey + "&steamid=76561197994394917&format=json");

        SteamResponse response = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<SteamResponse>(json);

I've visited the URL in browser to verify it's correct, and I've also tested the URL using JSON Lint. I'm not sure what I'm doing wrong here - I've checked other topics and checked for the problems they've listed but didn't find them.

Here is a link to the JSON I'm attempting to receive.

devdigital devdigital · Accepted Answer · 2015-11-21T22:45:35

You've created a RootObject type, but you're not using it in the deserialization. Have you tried:

var root = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<RootObject>(json);
// access root.response;

Unexpected character encountered while parsing value:

1 Answers