$readmemh -- is there something better?

In reply to aale:

Use $fscanf instead of $fgets

typedef bit [15:0] uint16_t;
typedef uint16_t uint16q_t[$];
function automatic uint16q_t get_file_lines(string file_name);
      int fd;
      uint16_t value; 
      fd = $fopen(file_name, "r");
      if (fd)  begin
          $display("File %s was opened successfully", file_name);
          while ($fscanf(fd,"%x",value))
              get_file_lines.push_back(value);
      end else begin     
          $display("File %s was NOT opened successfully", file_name);
      end
      $fclose(fd);
  endfunction : get_file_lines