Back-to-school / new semester F2P checklist (KR, JP, US variants)

Semester starts change session patterns for midcore more than casual. This checklist forces dated calendar rows for Korea, Japan and the United States before a “back to school” flight. Official holiday overviews: Korea.net Holidays, JNTO Japan holiday calendar, timeanddate US holidays. School-term start dates are set by education authorities and local boards; they are not identical to public holidays and must be confirmed per year and prefecture/district.

Operator checklist

1. Separate three calendars: Do not run one global “BTS” flight date for KR+JP+US.
2. KR: Note national holidays that collide with semester windows from Korea.net; confirm academic-year start with a current Ministry/education source before locking.
3. JP: Use JNTO’s holiday calendar for national holidays; confirm学期開始 with school-board or publisher local ops — national holidays alone are insufficient.
4. US: Labor Day and local district calendars differ; timeanddate US holidays is a public-holiday index, not a nationwide school-start law.
5. Creative: Avoid assuming “kids returning” imagery where the title’s rated audience is 17+ midcore adults.
6. Live-ops sync: Align battle-pass resets and energy gifts with the local first-week-of-term window you actually documented.
7. Measurement: Tag cohorts by geo+week so post-holiday organic uplift is not misread as paid efficiency.

Facts vs limits

This is an ops hygiene sheet, not a market-size essay.

Download the evidence table.

Research checked 20 September 2026. Local draft; human editorial review pending. No CMS write performed.