Squid Game: Warzone
Read the story- Brand
- Netflix
- Year
- 2025
- Objective
- Product Launch
- Industry
- Entertainment
- Mechanic
- Arcade & Action
- Platform
- In-Game
Objective
Netflix needed to keep Squid Game season 2 culturally alive past its December 26 premiere and push that momentum into January, this time reaching hardcore gamers as part of a wider partner slate that also included Burger King, Domino's, Duolingo, and Google. Activision took the other side of the deal to give Black Ops 6 and Warzone a reason to hold players through the mid-season lull before Season 2, and to monetize the crossover with a paid reward track and cosmetic bundles — Netflix and Activision built it direct, with no outside creative agency credited.
Solution
Log into Black Ops 6 or Warzone between January 3 and 28, 2025, and five limited-time modes built around the show are waiting: a Red Light, Green Light shootout on a stadium map, a five-round Pentathlon that rotates modes, a Moshpit of familiar playlists with Squid Game twists, a Zombies run through Dead Light, Green Light, and a Warzone squad mode on Urzikstan where losing a round means elimination. Every bit of XP earned anywhere in the game, not just in these modes, climbs a free 10-tier reward track toward Player 006 and Player 115 skins and a Cleaver machete at the top; spend 1,100 CoD Points and a parallel premium track unlocks instantly, ending with the Front Man operator. Alongside the modes, the store sells three separate bundles built around the Pink Guards, the VIPs, and Young-hee. The whole event got a four-day extension, running through January 28 right up to Season 2's launch instead of ending January 24 as planned.
Results
Despite the tie-in, Black Ops 6 kept bleeding players: average Steam player counts dropped 43.56% in December 2024 and were down a further 7.26% into January 2025, against a November 2024 peak above 300,000 concurrent players.
- 1
Between January 3 and 28, 2025, players open Black Ops 6 or Warzone and find a Squid Game event tab in the menu, presenting two parallel reward tracks of ten tiers each: a free track and a paid track.
- 2
Progress on both tracks comes from XP earned anywhere in the game — multiplayer, Zombies, or Warzone, not just the themed playlists — with tier thresholds ranging from 6,000 to 356,000 XP.
- 3
Players unlock an initial reward immediately with no XP required: the free track grants the 'Player 006' operator skin, and buying the premium track for 1,100 CoD Points grants a blueprint for the XM4 assault rifle.
- 4
In the Red Light, Green Light multiplayer playlist, players race across a stadium field in three two-minute rounds, moving only while the Young-hee doll signals 'Green Light' and freezing instantly on 'Red Light' or else being eliminated; the first round is unarmed, while the second and third add weapons, melee, and finishing moves.
- 5
The Pentathlon playlist chains five rounds of rotating modes — Domination, Kill Confirmed, Hardpoint, a Piggy Bank Team Deathmatch where kills fill a shared bank that later drops onto the map for teams to fight over, and Roulette, where a one-hit-kill handgun that scores double points can also explode in the shooter's hand — and the match can end in a draw.
- 6
Squid Game Moshpit layers three event mechanics onto standard TDM, Domination, and Hardpoint matches: a Red Light, Green Light scorestreak that freezes every enemy or eliminates those who move, Piggy Bank drops from defeated operators plus one map-wide Mega Piggy Bank, and a central Roulette Handgun that grants a permanent UAV, one-hit kills, and double points at the cost of exposing its holder's position and risking an in-hand explosion.
- 7
In the Zombies mode Dead Light, Green Light on Liberty Falls and Citadelle des Morts, players earn boosted Essence for kills during Green Light phases, lose Essence for moving during Red Light phases, and then face intensified enemy waves in a Dead Light phase.
- 8
In Warzone's Squid Game mode on Urzikstan, squads advance through a sequence of rounds each with its own objective, with the worst-performing squads eliminated after every round until a final group remains, and a surprise Red Light, Green Light challenge can trigger at any time, forcing the whole squad to freeze or be eliminated.
- 9
Reaching each XP tier unlocks cosmetic rewards — loading screens, emblems, stickers, weapon blueprints, finishing moves, charms, and skins — free-track rewards culminating in a Cleaver melee weapon and premium-track rewards culminating in the Front Man operator, while the store separately sells three bundles themed around the Pink Guards, VIPs, and Young-hee.
- 10
The event modes and Event Pass were removed from the game on January 28, 2025 with the start of Season 2, ending further progress and leaving players only with the cosmetics they had already earned.
