Easter Eggs & secrets
Hidden songs, ciphers, radios and other discoveries — the trigger, the interaction, and what it gives you. These are not the map-finishing quests: for those, see Main Quests.
Musical Easter Egg · Five
"Five" — Musical Easter Egg ("Won’t Back Down")
"Five" swaps the usual Sherwood original for a licensed track: "Won’t Back Down" by Eminem, started by answering the Pentagon’s three ringing, flashing red rotary phones. One sits by Quick Revive at spawn and one down in the labs — but the third is inside the Pack-a-Punch panic room, so the song is gated behind the full DEFCON procedure. Once per game.
Musical Easter Egg · Ascension
Ascension — Musical Easter Egg ("Abracadavre")
Ascension’s "Abracadavre" — Kevin Sherwood and Elena Siegman again, built on a remix of the menu theme "Damned" — hides behind three teddy bears, each clutching a sickle in a nod to the Soviet setting. All three sit in the opening half of the map.
Musical Easter Egg · Buried
Buried — Musical Easter Egg ("Always Running")
Buried’s "Always Running" — Kevin Sherwood, with Malukah’s vocals — hides its three teddy bears across the subterranean town, one of them inside the haunted mansion where reaching it costs a run past the ghosts.
Musical Easter Egg · Call of the Dead
Call of the Dead — Musical Easter Egg ("Not Ready to Die")
Call of the Dead swaps the house composer for a headliner: "Not Ready to Die", written for the map by Avenged Sevenfold, with lyrics that reference Group 935 and Samantha and the "Damned" motif buried near the end. Three meteorites start it.
Musical Easter Egg · Der Eisendrache
Der Eisendrache — Musical Easter Egg ("Dead Again")
Der Eisendrache’s "Dead Again" reunites Kevin Sherwood and Elena Siegman in the eagle’s-nest castle, its three teddy bears scattered from a child’s bedroom to the rocket pad — a map’s whole history in three toys.
Musical Easter Egg · Der Riese
Der Riese — Musical Easter Egg ("Beauty of Annihilation")
Der Riese’s hidden song is "Beauty of Annihilation", written by Kevin Sherwood and performed by Elena Siegman. Three green glowing jars, each holding a preserved spine and brain, are tucked around the facility — two in the Animal Testing Lab and one in a side room near a teleporter. Press use on all three, in any order, and the track plays.
Musical Easter Egg · Die Rise
Die Rise — Musical Easter Egg ("We All Fall Down")
Die Rise’s "We All Fall Down" — Kevin Sherwood with Clark S. Nova — doubles as the map’s death song, and its opening spells out Roman numerals for 115 and 1665, the year of the Great Plague. Three teddy bears in the towers start it properly.
Musical Easter Egg · Gorod Krovi
Gorod Krovi — Musical Easter Egg ("Dead Ended")
Gorod Krovi hides "Dead Ended" — Kevin Sherwood with Clark S. Nova — behind three vodka bottles, the only container Stalingrad respects. A second secret, three ace-of-spades cards, plays a re-recorded Motörhead "Ace of Spades" for Nikolai’s mech round.
Musical Easter Egg · Kino der Toten
Kino der Toten — Musical Easter Egg ("115")
"115" — Kevin Sherwood with Elena Siegman on vocals — is the first musical easter egg written for a specific map, and its trigger set the three-hidden-items template the series still uses. Three Element 115 meteor fragments hide around the theater, all in rooms on the normal route, so the song costs nothing but attention.
Musical Easter Egg · Mob of the Dead
Mob of the Dead — Musical Easter Egg ("Where Are We Going")
Alcatraz hides its song behind its signature mechanic instead of teddy bears: "Where Are We Going" — Kevin Sherwood and James McCawley, sung by Malukah — is unlocked from the electric number pad in the Citadel Tunnels, and only ghost fingers can dial it. At 2:24 it is the shortest lyrical song in the series.
Musical Easter Egg · Mob of the Dead
Mob of the Dead — Musical Easter Eggs
Mob of the Dead carries two hidden songs — Johnny Cash’s "Rusty Cage" and Malukah’s "Where Are We Going" — each behind its own set of concealed interactions, with a third orchestral piece reserved for the quest’s secret ending. Both sets are reachable in a normal game without main-quest progress.
Musical Easter Egg · Moon
Moon — Musical Easter Egg ("Coming Home")
Moon’s "Coming Home" — Kevin Sherwood with Elena Siegman — is triggered by three teddy bears wearing P.E.S. helmets, a costume choice that says everything about where the song lives. A second track, Avenged Sevenfold’s "Nightmare", plays for anyone who earns the One Giant Leap achievement’s strange resurrection.
Musical Easter Egg · Origins
Origins — Musical Easter Egg ("Archangel")
Origins’ "Archangel" runs at 230 beats per minute — twice 115 — with vocals from Clark S. Nova, Malukah and Elena Siegman, and lyrics that quote nearly every easter-egg song before it. Three green Divinium rocks in the mud start it; three red radios elsewhere play the map’s second anthem, Avenged Sevenfold’s "Shepherd of Fire".
Musical Easter Egg · Revelations
Revelations — Musical Easter Egg ("The Gift")
Revelations hides its song, "The Gift", behind three teddy bears placed across three different map fragments. Interact with all three and the track plays. Every bear sits on the natural route between fragments — no wall-runs or main-quest progress required.
Musical Easter Egg · Shadows of Evil
Shadows of Evil — Musical Easter Egg ("Snakeskin Boots")
Morg City’s song fits its decade: "Snakeskin Boots", a jazz-swing number composed by Jack Wall with Rick Riso’s vocals and Cindy Shapiro’s lyrics — the rare entry from outside the Sherwood and Avenged Sevenfold catalogues. Tapping one radio twice and the others once plays the instrumental instead.
Musical Easter Egg · Shangri-La
Shangri-La — Musical Easter Egg ("Pareidolia")
Shangri-La’s "Pareidolia" — Kevin Sherwood and Elena Siegman — hides its three meteorites along the temple’s opening paths, and the song went on to serve as the death music for two other maps. Decades later it was remastered for Black Ops 7’s Astra Malorum.
Musical Easter Egg · Shi No Numa
Shi No Numa — Musical Easter Egg ("The One")
Shi No Numa carries the series’ first proper hidden song: "The One", composed by Kevin Sherwood with vocals by Elena Siegman — the debut of the collaboration that would score the mode’s music eggs for years. It is started from the telephone in the Comm Room hut; interact with it and a short, unsettling message plays before the track begins.
Musical Easter Egg · TranZit
TranZit — Musical Easter Egg ("Carrion")
TranZit’s "Carrion" — written and performed by Kevin Sherwood with Clark S. Nova on vocals — spreads its teddy bears across three bus stops, demanding a full loop of Green Run to start one song. Avenged Sevenfold’s "Carry On" was originally slated for the slot and plays over Black Ops II’s post-credits instead.
Musical Easter Egg · Verrückt
Verrückt — Musical Easter Egg ("Lullaby of a Deadman")
Verrückt hides the first player-triggered song in Zombies: "Lullaby of a Deadman", by Kevin Sherwood with Elena Siegman — a track that had already played over Nacht der Untoten’s game-over screen before the asylum made it summonable. The trigger is deliberately absurd: a toilet in the German-side upstairs, flushed three times. In the World at War original the song plays almost inaudibly quietly; the remasters gave it a proper mix.
Musical Easter Egg · Zetsubou No Shima
Zetsubou No Shima — Musical Easter Egg ("Dead Flowers")
Zetsubou No Shima trades teddy bears for sock monkeys: three of them, hidden between the labs and the bunker, start "Dead Flowers" — Kevin Sherwood with James McCawley, sung by Malukah.