—This paper proposes a conceptual framework for mobile learning applications that provides systematic support for mobile learning experience design. It is based on a combination of a game metaphor and several studies of mobile learning contexts. Accounts of four mobile learning projects are used to explore the relationship between the framework and mobile learning design requirements in practice. By applying the framework to previous successful mobile learning implementations, we are better able to understand their key qualities. Similarly, the framework provides forward engineering support for the successful design of future mobile learning systems.