Serious games and serious play both have an issue. The issue is, the word serious. It sounds far too, well, serious!
I have heard lots of people complaining about this, somewhat misunderstanding what the serious refers to. “Why can’t it be fun, not serious?” “Serious does not sound fun, that can’t be right!”
Obviously the serious in these terms is there to differentiate entertainment focused and non-entertainment focused games. That is to say, games that we play just to enjoy the experience and games that we play to achieve something, such as learning and skills acquisition.