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Art (D'ni))
One of the most intriguing cultural aspects of the fictional D'ni featured in the computer game Myst was the Art; their ability to write special books that describe and link to worlds. The description is put into Descriptive books, of which only one per Age (a described world) can exist. There can be, however, multiple linking books, not necessarily pointing to the same location in an Age. For example, the linking book found by the Stranger at the beginning of Myst points to the island's pier, whereas those found in the various related Ages, such as Channelwood, point to the library.
Linking books have a viewing panel that shows a picture of the target location. The panel is interactive: by merely touching it, the person links to the Age. (In the Myst game, the player always links to an island in the Age, primarily to keep the software "universe" finite and manageable. Furthermore, in most of the games, the viewing panels are animated, showing a "fly-by" video with a camera panning around the target location. The 'real' linking books did not have such features.)
Only members of the Guild of Writers were taught and allowed to write descriptive books, and one of the Guild of Maintainers's jobs was to ensure the Ages' stability. It is debatable whether describing an Age creates it, or merely finds a pre-existing world: Gehn was convinced that he (and the other Writers) was a Maker with God-like powers over the Ages he linked to, whereas most of the D'ni, including Gehn's son Atrus, did not believe so.
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