ABSTRACT
An imaginary, or constructed, world can range from a complex allegory utilized within a rhetorical argument such as Plato's Atlantis or Thomas More's Utopia, or they may be little more than a children's toy. But all imaginary worlds possess one thing in common: all have been definitively created by human, knowable intelligence, utilizing tools that can be described, replicated, and, in turn, studied. This chapter explores these world-building tools, and the varying forms of media in which they exist, and explores the advantages and disadvantages of each. It demonstrates, through analysis of the forms themselves, that the types of tools used to construct an imaginary world have a major impact on its functionality and impact upon its audience. World-building using tactile components or materials is decidedly different to textual world-building. World-building in a digital environment is something of a hybrid of textual and physical world-building.
