The author Eric Berne was a psychiatrist specializing in psychotherapy who began developing alternate theories of interpersonal relationship dynamics in the 1950s.

Berne did not intend for Games People Play to explore all aspects of transactional analysis, viewing it instead as an introduction to some of the concepts and patterns he identified.

In a Time magazine article titled "The Names of the Games," speculated that the book's popularity was due to its applications for both self-help and "cocktail party talk.

A 1974 article by Roger W. Hite in Speech Teacher noted that although its theoretical basis had inspired numerous subsequent publications, there was little research or scientific support for it.

[7] Ben L. Glancy in a review for Quarterly Journal of Speech described Berne's work as "parlor psychiatry and party-time psychoanalysis."

[8] Some scholars, including proponents of transactional analysis, have expressed concern over the popularization of oversimplified psychological concepts as self-help methods.