Sable Coast

Every year the captains of the Lamu archipelago meet for the Mashujaa Cup, the oldest dhow race on the East African coast. You are a young captain from Lamu Town, chasing a cup your family once held, skimming the channel between Lamu and Manda in a tradewater dhow patched together from cedar, cotton sail, and salt.

The ocean is the real opponent. Read the monsoon wind, trim your sail to the gusts, and ride the tide that floods the channel twice a day. Thread the reef at Shela, cut inside Matondoni, and pray the weather holds long enough to cross the line first. When the kaskazi shifts mid-race, the route you planned at the start is suddenly the wrong one.

Career mode starts with a borrowed ngalawa and the hull of your grandfather's dhow in a Matondoni yard. Rebuild it plank by plank, recruit a crew from the seafront and the narrow streets of Lamu Old Town, and take on the rival captains who have held the cup for a generation. Win the small races, earn the big dhows, and bring the Mashujaa Cup home.