Games held a spiritual element from ancient times that by the late Middle Ages gave way to gambling. Victorian backlash against dice and card games sought to reposition games as moral educational tools.

Britain exported the moral instructional board game to America, where it was adapted to celebrate wealth and free enterprise in the best-selling game Monopoly. Cluedo, Scrabble, and Monopoly went on to become enduring British family favourites post-war. In the 1980s game development began turning toward fantasy role-playing and computer games.