I've heard people talk about "creating an experience," as a way to approach designing games. But it seems like it is so broad of a concept that it could apply to any form of entertainment.
Experience arises from multiple factors. Some of which are the type of media, and how it is made. Another factor is the context in which the media is seen, which includes location and other beings. Certainly, the experience of watching a movie differs vastly if you are in a theater with enthusiastic fans, or watching it alone on your iPad. And reading a book is different than looking at a painting.
When playing a game, much of the experience a player has is beyond the control of the creator. You can imagine where it might be played, and account for that, but you don't know. You also don't know what the personalities of the players will be like, whether their tastes align with your design tastes, etc.
So "creating an experience" may be a useful reminder to remember that everything will be viewed or played in a context, and that you can influence the overall experience with your choices, but its not very concrete or useful advice about creating games in particular.
To contrast the idea of "creating an experience", I ask, "What are the unique elements of a game that sets it apart from other forms of media?"
It is dynamic, as opposed to static. Multiple times through a game yield different paths. Barring "the experience", that is not true for static media such as books or movies. But somewhat true for improvisational music.
It is controlled by player choices or luck, but not pre-determined.
You can win and lose at games. If you can't it is more like a simulation or a ride or a toy.
It is something you play with as a way of interacting with it. Similar to a toy.
It is primarily rules based. "Conceptual" as opposed to being "sensual" (primarily senses based). Similar to reading, as opposed to watching a movie or listening to music. A player is re-creating an experience that a designer had. It is sort of similar to playing music yourself off of sheet music. This applies way less to computer based games where there are simulated, sensual rich worlds you play within, and much more to Role-playing games.
It is procedural, as opposed to end result-oriented. Other media have a procedure which produces a result, and that result is the point, ie the book, the painting, and so forth. Except for improvisational music, which is also procedural. With a game, you follow procedures to re-create the thing, instead of being given or shown a copy of the thing, or the thing itself that was the result of a previous procedure.
As usual, when I get down to defining what a game is, I find it shares qualities with other types of media, and that definition itself can only go so far before everything seems difficult to define clearly. But this is a good way to help distinguish games from other media. A good starting point for defining "Game" as a medium.