Games are free, but sign up through EventBrite to skip the lines on game day! Participation priority will be given to people who sign up on EventBrite.

Celebrate with Come Out and Play SF and SOMArts as we kick off three weeks of city-sized games for all ages! The Come Out & Play SF Festival, a forum for new types of public games and play, expands in 2012 to include a month-long games exhibition in SOMArts Cultural Center’s Main Gallery, November 17–December 19, 2012.

From alternative sports, board games and puzzles to iPad apps, laser mazes and proximity sensors, Come Out & Play SF Festival and Exhibition harnesses the ingenuity of game designers to engage San Francisco’s communities in creative play and to transcend preconceptions around human interaction and public space.

Opening night party games include (but are not limited to):

• Shadowplay: A large-scale street game projected directly onto the walls of the city! Players jump, dash, stretch and contort their shadows in a bid to score points by eclipsing objects floating through the game.
• Sixteen Tons: Four players face off in a strategy game that uses heavy sections of steel pipe as the game pieces. At the beginning of the game, players take out three dollar bills from their wallets to bribe other players into moving your pieces for you. The strategy element is simple to solve – but the social play of Sixteen Tons is impossible to predict.
• WANTED!: Maggie Durrant, head cowgirl at the Cowgirl Way Society, is WANTED by the law! 1-10 players take on cowgirl roles in this 30-minute interactive Western drama. SMS prompts build character and intrigue while cowgirls try to help Maggie get out of town.
• Hearst Collection: Players navigate an in-gallery laser maze to steal pieces from the Hearst family’s collection of priceless paintings and sculptures from the ancient and modern worlds. Security will be tight, so watch your step.
• Doodle Defense: A low-tech, whiteboard-based tower defense game in which players race to draw game pieces to beat the onslaught of bugs.
• The Board Game Lounge: A replication of your living room, but with brand-new board games made by local designers--the handmade Berlin Wall Game, The Cove, and Toy Fight, and the high-tech Sifteo cubes.

In addition to an opening night party with artist facilitated games, Saturday, November 17, 6pm–9pm, Come Out & Play SF also includes the annual festival weekend of games for all ages, Saturday and Sunday, December 1 & 2, 12pm–5pm. Festival weekend games are hosted in the gallery at SOMArts and in public spaces and recreation areas in the surrounding South of Market (SoMa) neighborhood.

About Come Out and Play
Come Out & Play was founded in 2006 to offer the public new ways to enjoy and experience their city through games played in public spaces. It was the first festival of its kind in the world and remains a leader in identifying trends in public gaming and an inspiration for games festivals worldwide.