With igest 2009 over, its worth noting its success and celebrating the fact that over 1000 players raced through Bristol, chased moose with their mobile phones, played a 100-player game of Snakes and Ladders and painted the town – and each other – red.

Wired magazine described igfest as “incorporating elements of augmented reality and crowdsourced theatre.” The interview with Simon Johnson stressed that street gaming is not all just running around. As he explaines, a good pervasive game changes the players' perception of the people and environment around them, and explores the concept of permission.

Ifgest might be over for another year, but pervasive gaming events can be found throughout the UK. Simon Games’ iglab, a beta test of games in development runs every month in Bristol and Hide&Seek is touring its mini-festival Sandpit until late November with monthly events in London.

igfest 09 is an international celebration of Street, Pervasive and Social games. It is programmed by Simon Games
with support from the National Lottery through Arts Council England, along with HP Labs, Watershed, Pervasive Media Studio, RELAYS and South West Screen.