A secondary progressive award is provided for a wide-area progressive wagering game as a celebration or participation award. A processor circuit determines that a winning condition for a wide-area progressive wagering game has been satisfied for a gaming device of a plurality of eligible gaming devices. For each gaming device of the plurality of eligible gaming devices, it is determined whether the gaming device meets a predetermined activity condition, and a subset of active gaming devices of the plurality of eligible gaming devices is determined based on the active gaming devices meeting the predetermined activity condition. A primary progressive award is provided to a user of the a gaming device associated with the winning condition, and a secondary progressive award is provided to each gaming device of the determined subset of active gaming devices.