The lusory attitude is the psychological attitude required of a player entering into the play of a game.
[1] To adopt a lusory attitude is to accept the arbitrary rules of a game, even though those rules often make the experience more challenging, in order to facilitate the resulting experience of play.
[2] The term was coined by Bernard Suits in the book The Grasshopper: Games, Life and Utopia,[1] first published in 1978, in which Suits defines the playing of a game as "the voluntary attempt to overcome unnecessary obstacles".
[2] He also offers a fuller definition: For example, when two individuals play the pen-and-paper game Hangman, they aim to arrive at the same word through contrived means, thereby accepting the lusory attitude required by the game's rules.