# KPR x Esther Choi: Ramen Wars > Ramen Wars was KPR's first major step into phygital storytelling: a campaign built around the idea that the line between digital experience and real-world impact doesn't have to exist. - Year: 2024 - Disciplines: Product - Role: Creative Director, Design Director - Agency Partner: Merci-Michel - Art: Khoa Viet - Designer: Rafael Cespedes (https://rafaelcespedes.com) Ramen Wars was KPR's first major step into phygital storytelling: a campaign built around the idea that the line between digital experience and real-world impact doesn't have to exist. It started with a web-based game. Players dropped into a narrative set in Prisma City, collected ingredients, and crafted digital ramen dishes to earn raffle entries. Those entries unlocked prizes that escalated in significance: exclusive merchandise, travel, personal experiences with Chef Esther Choi, and the chance to have a player's digital creation featured on a real restaurant menu. The result was a campaign that gave KPR and Esther Choi a genuinely interactive way to reach their communities. Over three weeks, Ramen Wars brought in 20K+ players and generated over $1M in Chibi-Go sales. The concept proved its value and the framework served as the foundation for future activations with other Creators. ## Featured Creator: Esther Choi KPR partnered with chef, restaurateur, and entrepreneur Esther Choi to anchor Ramen Wars around a real culinary voice. The founder of Mŏkbar and Ms. Yoo, Esther's cooking is rooted in the techniques of her Korean grandmother and driven by the belief that food is the ultimate form of cultural expression. To bring her into the KPRverse, we designed a custom 2D character in her likeness, translating her identity into the visual language of the game world. ## Meet BOON Ramen BOON Ramen is a phygital brand developed in collaboration with KPR and Chef Esther Choi. Born inside the game as a narrative centerpiece, it was designed from the start with a real-world future in mind: a retail brand built for supermarkets and store shelves. The branding covers the full scope, from core logo and world-building art to conceptual packaging. ## Game Design The core design challenge was building a game with enough depth to sustain three weeks of engagement without alienating a non-gamer audience. KPR's and Esther’s communities spans collectors, food enthusiasts, and Web3 natives. The experience needed to feel rewarding from the first session and worth returning to every day. The solution was a layered loop with a clear daily rhythm. Players arrive on the map, dispatch their Chibi-Go courier to a point of interest, and play a mini-game to earn ingredients. Performance in the mini-game determines how quickly the Chibi-Go returns, giving skilled players a tangible advantage without locking out casual ones. When the courier returns, a chest reveal delivers the ingredients, which feed into an XP progression system that unlocks new areas of the map over time. Each new area unlocks new ingredients and a new chapter of the story. The daily anchor is the Kitchen (BOON Ramen). Once per day, if a player has the right ingredients, they can craft a ramen dish and earn a raffle ticket. The more tickets accumulated, the more rewards a player becomes eligible for. Each location in Prisma City has its own identity, visual language, story, and set of ingredients, making exploration feel purposeful. We collaborated with Merci-Michel on final design execution, technical implementation, and balancing the game mechanics. My role covered the overall design direction, high-level gameplay loop, branding of all in-game entities and locations, art direction for the characters, kitchen, and environments, and production of all marketing assets, rewards, and partner decks. ## Images and video - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/carousel/01_rw-map_02.webp - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/carousel/02_rw-dialogue_02.webp - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/carousel/03_rw-kitchen_02.webp - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/case-study/vid_esther-looping.mp4 - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/case-study/02_esther-kpr-03.webp - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/case-study/03_Boon_storefront.webp - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/case-study/04_boon-logo_01.webp - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/case-study/05_boon-packaging_02.webp - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/case-study/06_ramen-wars_user-flow_01.webp - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/case-study/vid_rw-collect-ingredients_02.mp4 - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/case-study/vid_ramen-creation_02.mp4 - https://rafaelcespedes.com/projects/kpr-web-game/case-study/08_prisma-map_01.webp --- From the portfolio of Rafael Cespedes. Everything about him in one file: https://rafaelcespedes.com/llms-full.txt · Updated 2026-11-08