About
Nicola Manzini had 3,300 followers on X when he launched VibeSail on March 1, 2025 — a free, browser-based 3D sailing simulator you can play without downloading anything. Inspired by Pieter Levels' viral flight sim, he built the first version in four days using Cursor and Claude 3.7, with Three.js handling the 3D ocean and WebSockets powering real-time multiplayer. About 85% of the code was AI-generated. What turned a weekend project into a business wasn't the technology — it was posting 20+ updates per day for two straight weeks, sharing every bug, every new island, every leaderboard result in public. Sponsors started showing up. Atlantic Records became a backer. CoinGecko followed. Today the game generates $8,000/month through branded island advertising, with 41 explorable islands and daily competitive races.
Screenshots
Build Timeline
First update
Launched in 4 days — 85% AI-generated, one inspired weekend Cursor + Claude 3.7 + Three.js. First playable version in four days. Multiplayer sailing, 3D ocean, islands to explore. No downloads. Inspired directly by @levelsio's flight sim going viral. I figured: if planes work, why not boats?
20+ posts a day. Even on the days with nothing to post.
I posted on the day I moved apartments. I posted to say I had nothing to post. Building in public means showing the process, not just the milestones. That consistency is what made strangers feel invested in a game they'd played once.
Daily leaderboard races: 100+ attempts, players from 12 countries
Added a daily sailing time trial. People keep coming back to beat their own scores and compete on the leaderboard. 100+ attempts on a single day's track. That's retention we didn't engineer — it came from the race format.
Atlantic Records is a sponsor. So is CoinGecko.
Proud to share that @AtlanticRecords is now a supporter of VibeSail. @CoinGecko followed. Branded islands across the map, $8k/month in advertising revenue. I had 3,300 followers when I launched. Nobody came to me — I built in public until they did.
$8k/month from in-game ads. Next: player customisation.
The ad model works — brands pay to sponsor islands. Now adding boat customisation so players can express themselves. The goal is $15k MRR by mid-year and a proper mobile version of the race mode.