Could the design of specific game types lead to better user experiences? Does a specific type of game make it more enjoyable, and increase the quality of the user experience? This highly interesting paper is addressed to researchers and practitioners within the interaction design field who are designing play and playful experiences, including games.

The authors propose a model/classification with four types of game play based on player behavior and engagement:

Conformant play, which is the “normal” engagement model;

Explorative play, which is curiosity driven;

Creative play, where there is a collective agreement on changing the game/play open-ended design structures; and

Transgressive play, when players deliberately violate the predefined game/play structures.

The strong point of this paper is that the authors’ proposed model, which is based on theories of play from anthropology, psychology, and play studies, is well presented. Via three case studies, the reader can understand the proposed classification and when the game design enables (facilitates) players to conform, explore, transgress, or (re)create the game rules/structures.

However, it would have been great if the authors could have included more than three case studies so that the reader could delve into the details of each game type. In fact, a research group could write a new review paper to analyze well-known games based on the proposed classification model. Also, the authors could have discussed whether the proposed classification could be an evaluation framework/tool.

It is well known that the creation of digital games is an ill-structured problem. Thus, researchers who are working on models that could explain how the technology, social structures, and spatial aspects of a game can influence play activity and experience could see the added value of this paper.

Furthermore, this paper can provide insights into issues related to designing play activities. Models like the one presented here can help and guide game designers on how they should make decisions about the elements that make up the game as a system, and how these elements should be interrelated and balanced, in order to create the desired flow that could lead to positive user experiences [1,2]. In addition, several new research challenges arise when such models of play appear.