An interesting development recently that has been on the news in several cities is a new type of game playing called “Location Based Games”. These are apparently games played out in the real world, like cities or streets or even across suburbs and even in unpopulated nature areas like hiking trails, which use different types of mobile technology like GPS receivers and cellphones to create games with many people that have to do some physical activity to play the game. And there are new companies and services that also seem to add a king of real world game to things our phones and computers can already do. Foursquare (named after the game foursquare) and Gowalla use mobile phones and awards to create a game out of places you visit: read more on the New York Times.

There are a whole bunch of other location based games being created, the most interesting example that seems to get kids excited about the possibilities is one called Pacmanhattan: a kind of real world game of pacman, turning it into a tag or catch and chase type game (note: this does not look very safe to play in a city.)

There are also a full list of other types of locative games on the wikipedia location based game page you can read about: Wikipedia.

Foursquare is a physical ball game similar combining elements of volleyball, kickball, and dodgeball. Its played in a four square quadrant which are ranked from one to four, four generally being the position of most authority. Sometimes, the player in the fourth square and highest ranking position can change the game’s rules at the beginning of each round by calling a style of gameplay or not allowing certain types of gameplay, like double-taps, underhand-only, and other types of play.

The foursquare player location in the highest numbered square begins the game by serving the ball from the outside corner of the square. The ball must bounce once in the servers own square before entering another players square. Players must let the ball bounce once in their own square, and then return the ball in the same method as the server. Balls are similar to kickballs and dodgeballs, being light rubber and with good bounce. The play must only use their hands to hit, serve, or return the ball. Carrying or holding or catching the ball are all penalties and forfeits.

Once the ball touches the play surface in another players square, that player must continue by hitting it into any other square. The ball continues to be hit back and forth between squares until a player makes a forfeit or penalty, and gets eliminated by leaving the square.

The rest of players move up to their next highest squares number, and another (or the recently eliminated) player joins the game in the lowest square (one). If there are more than four players foor a square, the eliminated players just wait in line for their turn to re-enter the game.

Double Dutch rules involve both double dutch jumprope single teams, which are usually made up of three members, and double dutch doubles teams with four members. The American Double Dutch League rules for competitive double dutch stipulates a gender restriction on the teams (limited to one male member for singles, and two male members for doubles), but these should generally be ignored in the interests of fun.

Hold the ends of the ropes tightly, shoulder width apart, about waist high, but do not wrap the rope around your hands. Rope turners should always start turning the rope closest to the jumper first, to enable the jumper to enter the ropes easier. Turn the ropes inward in small circles by turning the right forearm counter clockwise and left forearm clockwise like an eggbeater, while avoiding crossing the midline of your body with your hands as they rotate the jump ropes. You can count one-two’s to help establish a rhythm for both turners, and jumper.

The person jumping in, aka the jumper, stands next to one of the jumprope turners and faces the other rope turner. The jumper-in’s legs should be in position with their leg closest to the rope turner facing away from the rope and the other leg closer to the rope. Jumping In starts when the jumper-in enters the ropes as the rope closest to the jumper passes their eye level. Take one large step and a single jump, and leap into the middle of the rope with the leg closest to the rope turner hitting the floor first. The jumper begins jumping using a two-foot basic marching jump. If your just learning, use the single bounce jump in, and then slowly work your way up to two ropes.

UPDATE: a great recent story on NPR highlights the increasing use of physical jumprope and double dutch games in particular in nationwide schools as tournament play:

Yes, all you physical-game-integrationists, its time to get your phones on and hit the streets… conflux festival 2009 is here! Unfortunately for us, we’re not in New York City, but the types of physical games seem like they could easily spread!

cool stuff abounds… like the Urban Disorientation game, or the Human Scale Chess game, or a Citywide Golf Course.

Three days only, check out the full schedule here!