Ren'Py - Power Vacuum [Ch. 12 Official] [What? Why? Games]

So, after reading the last three years of reviews on Power Vacuum (yep, I actually did all that), I noticed that a large group of people were praising it, and a large group of people were damning it. I decided to download and see for myself, and after ~9 hours playing and firmly being in Chapter 4, I can say I completely and utterly agree... with the latter group.

+ Attractive models (but overly large bust/booty sizes diminish their allure)
+ Unique LI personalities, though it seems like every girl is bi-polar and swings wildly (permanent mensuration?)
+ Renders are well done with good color/lighting and environments
+ Some good humor, but it is far too overused
+ Fun "minigame" of thwarting gramps' machinations towards the LIs in the house
+ Good animations, for the very few you actually get to see

--- Tease, tease, tease! It took the MC 8 fricking hours to actually penetrate a side-story girl and lose his virginity. And that's RL gameplay time to get there. I hear sex with the main LIs doesn't happen for another 5-6 chapters. Insanity.
-- The humor actually happens in almost every 2nd to 3rd textbox, and destroys most of the enjoyment you'd otherwise have. It's like a psychotic clown on cocaine babbling to a monkey on heroin, nonstop.
-- Despite being a "sandbox", the game is anything but. You can only change the order of interactions/scenes within a chapter - you truly have NO choice in how the story unfolds (unless you have NTR turned on and fail a challenge). This is a disguised kinetic novel.
--------- I can't give this one enough minuses: The MC has NO FUCKING SPINE. He's a wimp, a simp, a pussy to the Nth degree. If there was an option for him in-game to commit suicide, I would have chosen it. Not. Kidding. At. All.
--- LIs around the house constantly walk all over the MC verbally, switching from teasing him, to debasing him, to apologizing, to doing it all over again in the next 10 minutes. Almost like it's a family tradition.
--- MC is constantly apologizing to the LIs, despite nearly constantly supporting them and their needs. Again: utter wimp.
--- There's almost no equality in the house with regards to pleasing LIs, and the LIs reciprocating - the MC is basically just a boy-handmaiden working for their needs. Again: total simp.

I could probably drop in another 7-10 negatives, but it's just exhausting and depressing to think back on the last 9 hours of gameplay. This COULD have been a phenominal game, right at the top with some legendary AVNs. But for the reasons above (among many, many others), it swung and missed. It's Femdom to the extreme, but veiled in such a way as to try and have the humor and renders cover it up, unsuccessfully. I hate to have to do it, as I really did want to enjoy PV, but it ends up a firm 2.0 rating from me.


Had to add this last bit:
Brenna: "There you go...lick it up....you sister fingering idiot..."

Yeah, I'm out. The femdom and male subjugation is just out of control on this one. Zero respect for the MC from any of his family members. Zero. Down to 1 star.

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Edit: So I pushed through a few more chapters, trying to give the developer the benefit of the doubt (for poor pacing in the early game), hoping it would get better. It did, slightly, with the MC gaining a bit more self esteem (a TINY bit), and sex scenes becoming more frequent.

And then the bastard writes the MC into a FORCED SUB relationship with his mother. Zero choice - the MC is back to being a sex toy, a sex slave, a sub.

=============

Finally pushed myself to finish the game, since I'd already spent ~16+ hours in it. It -does- get better on the frequency of sex (actually turns into a fuck-fest in Ch 11/12), and the femdom -does- lighten up a little bit. But the wacky overused humor continues throughout, and it remains basically a kinetic novel with the NTR-whoops-goback moments it's always had. The huge femdom moment that turned me off prior -does- go away (thank god), so it's not an abysmal failure anymore.

Against better judgement I'm going to give the game (through Chapter 12) a 2-star rating. Partly due to the glacial pacing for the first ~8 chapters, partly due to the overriding femdom elements, and partly due to the overused humor which wears super thin.

This game is a perfectly serviceable erotic game about turning your family into a harem. That part alone is well done and quite hot.

But I have to say, the writing in this game is something else. It's worth playing for the dialogue alone. Every other sentence is a pun or joke and they're all wonderfully creative and funny. I guess humor is subjective, but this is one of the best written games on the site and absolutely worth a try.

I will start this rating with a disclaimer

- THIS GAME CONTAINS UNAVOIDABLE NTR -

I played through all of the 12 chapter and i can say:
Don't let the home page fool you, it contains unavoidable NTR, such as the main antagonist groping the family members and other things, even if you have the NTR option turned off. So if you don't like ANY NTR in game i would not recommend this game to you.
If you ignore that you will have lots of good characters, a quirky story, and a bunch of good sex scenes.
To summarize:

The goods:
- Character design: the female characters look great and are all different from each other.
- Good side-plots: Self-explanatory, in many chapters you will have a new character with a nice side-plot.
- Story: Funny at times, maybe you will not like it if you're christian because they make off them. (But at the same time, why are you playing a porn game if you are christian in the first place? get off this life)
- Good sex scenes: Also self-explanatory, all characters have great sex scenes.

The bad:
- Nasty disgusting antagonist who wants to cuck you and constantly reminds you that he is going to cuck you at some point (gets pretty annoying, pretty fast)
- Boring tasks, sometimes you have to do the same thing over 10 times to unlock one scene, after Chapter 6 it gets better.

I would give this game a 3,5/5
I didn't play with NTR on but it's safe to say that if you like NTR (aka being a cuck) you will enjoy this game, highly recommend to you.
Mildly recommend otherwise.

This game was so fun to play, the renders and animations were great a bit loopy but not enough to ruin it. The characters are diverse and hot as hell, the writing of the game is a bit ridiculous but the game is not trying to be serious so it doesn't matter. The sheer amount of content mixed with the quality of the images was enough to put it at 5 stars. The NTR in the game is easily avoidable and honestly funny. Can't wait for the final chapter of the game and get the ending of this story. The only thing I'll say is I want to focus more on the main 3 in the family instead of adding more characters.

The writing is genuinely excellent!
Just finished Chapter 2 and this game climbed to my Top 5 in record time.

My only quibble is that the sandbox aspect feels a little unnecessary. This might just be my personal bias though, since I tend to prefer entirely VN-style unless the game is very mechanics-heavy.

Regardless, it's 5 stars from me!

I have to say, I've never left an actual review for the NSFW games I played before, but this one take's the cake! Even if there is minimal content of my preference (feet) in game, it literally made me turned on by the NTR (I never play NTR games). But now I will... Jesus!

It's a bit slow at start, and that's OK! It picks up after Chapter 4 or so! The NTR endings are my favourite (And I don't care for NTR lol!)

10/10!!! Congratulations to the developer!

Power Vacuum has one of the most well-organized and planned stories to come out of the porn industry in recent memory -- most (though not all) characters exhibit significant character development over the course of their arcs, the character(s) responsible for shifting the protagonist's relationship with the other characters into the light do so as a simple extension of their existing wants and tendencies, and the various plot developments revealed with each successive chapter strike an engaging balance between surprise twists and foreshadowed inevitability.

While humor is inherently subjective, the developers did a really good job of making it very clear what the game’s humor is like early on – people new to the game are able to quickly identify whether or not they’re able to vibe with the author’s sense of humor and choose whether to continue playing accordingly.

This is an incredibly well-crafted game that keeps the audience engaged throughout its run and exhibits a clear, coordinated effort to avoid unnecessarily attracting audience members that wouldn’t enjoy what it has to offer.

Great Cgs, good story progression (not too fast, not too slow), and an actually decent story. The writing style is also quite adept.
Hits some of my fetishes, sadly no impregnation thus far, it's only alluded to.

This game is an example of how not to combine such mechanics in games with such combinations. Kinetic choices + Boring NTR + sandbox + endless grind.
I thought I would never see such a bad combo in games again, but I was wrong. I can compare this game in terms of mechanics. for Foot of the Mountains 2 [version 5.0 Finale], Jen's Dilemma [chap. 2 v3] [Serial NumberComics] I'm shocked why this game has such high ratings? Does anyone see any problems with this game?

Graphics 9/10 very nice renders

Characters in the game 8/10 Everyone will find something for themselves, there are many of them. Female characters are not intelligent (stupid bimbo) . example of a mother drinking alcohol with her son while playing a board game. Characters Quickly Undress.

Attractiveness of character 7/10
Ophelia - her model appears in the WVM game - as Harper

Sex scenes 9/10
very nicely done

Journal/10/10
we know what you need to do in events, how many points you need to grid to unlock new scenes in events

Font 3/10
is ugly, weird and hard to read, it should be possible to change it

Endless grind 2/10 from Ch1-Ch12
to unlock progress in the next event, e.g. you need to earn 15 boring points for watching soap operas with your mom in this competition. For other events to move forward. You have to grind boring points to complete events.After each chapter you get even more new events, you guessed it, you have to earn boring points again. Additionally, you have to earn additional boring points for an event you have already completed. To unlock new scenes. And so indefinitely, which is terribly boring. The game doesn't respect your time.

NTR 3/10
extremely boring and stupid. Our Mc is competing with some Hanter, I hate who is he? (old ancient vampire, rotten zombie, mummy, living dead) our MC never stands a chance against Hanter, he is almost always doomed to failure, and Hanter is always two steps ahead of our MC

go to new chapter 3/10.
I'm bored with the game. You have to grind to unlock all subsequent scenes and events each time. At the end of the chapters. You will listen to Hanter's summary that you are hopeless and weak and you will not achieve anything without Hanter's help, and he will help you to be like him.

Kinetic Choices 3/10 –
I hate this in games.

avoid NTR-6/10
by downloading the patch? As a player, we won't see any scenes from NTR. But the dialogue suggests something else, that these scenes have already taken place – There should be dialogue that these scenes have not taken place on our route. The creators didn't want to add a few lines of dialogue that this scene didn't take place.

Plot 5/10,
nothing original that I didn't know about in other games

Dialogues/5/10
sometimes they are even interesting, you read everything with interest and it seems new to you the first time. And then you discover that when you don't unlock new events . You will have the same dialogues over and over again. The dialogue is incredibly stupid, as if all the characters were constantly horny and thinking about sex 24 hours a day.The dialogues sound as if they were written by a horny teenager who thinks about sex 24 hours a day

Building corruption 2/10
almost non-existent Everything happens very quickly, the characters spend 24 hours thinking about sex and quickly get down to business

To sum up, the game is not bad, but it has a few shortcomings that should be improved. If they don't bother you, you can play

I started this game years ago. I won't use a weighted system because I don't feel like it.


The story is... more interesting than it seems. You'll return to your family after your father's death and meet Hunter, a man whose skin resembles that of a scrotum. Hunter is a piece of shit and is willing to do anything to screw your family over. The game follows a classic pattern of daily events, gradually leading to more and more erotic scenes. One of the highlights of the game is perhaps the writing; more than once I found myself smiling at how absurd the dialogues can be. And the story... at some point, it becomes so... depraved. The animations are excellent, the developer has improved, and you can see progress in every chapter.

The problem with the game is the gameplay loop, which I find nonsensical, often created in a way to easily recycle renders... but it all feels a bit heavy after a while, although the interesting dialogues slightly salvage it. I would have preferred a kinetic novel.

Another thing I would like to praise are the models (Really important to me). Only a couple of them seem a bit uncanny, the rest are all excellent, among the best I've ever seen.

Anyway, in the end, it's definitely a good game in terms of its story concept and animation, and I'd like to reward its originality with 5 stars.

Great game. Amazing graphics and animations, so much variety and funny. There's really only one complaint: If you're into COF endings, you may be disppointed to realize that this is quite a rare case in this game.

This is easily the best game on f95. From stylistic yet unique renders to the funny ass story and dialogue. The progression each chapter isn't too little or too much. The NTR is funny to an extent if you don't take stuff too seriously(i only encountered it this latest chapter with a bad choice, still funny). Looking forward to the end of this hilarious journey.

I have played the latest update for chapter 12, this review will be Vanilla/NON-NTR path based. so if you're playing the game for NTR path you can skip this review. Below are my thoughts;

Till chapter 10, Ophelia's progression with Sterling was slow, once chapter 10 started that's when the anal sex started with Sterling and was the sex positions for that in the update [night time events with Ophelia] were also quite limited, so was quite disappointed with this update in terms of Ophelia. Because in this scene, like the bad end, Ophelia could have been the main girl but that would be too easy so Ophelia falls asleep here because she is tired , unlike in other scenes hahahah and MC takes on Aliza, wherein Aliza's event could continue on chapter 11 as well as her main morning event, and Aliza could have observed Sterling and Ophelia more, since Aliza has her event in Chapter 10 main end quest, Mallory is forced upon her in chapter 12. It's really chaotic, how scenes are given to a part of audience and denied to the other.

Then for chapter 11, I thought of giving the update another chance, it's clearly visible that the story was being pushed in this update so vaginal sex was introduced that too mid night scenes, and no kiss animation was there with Sterling till here, and Ophelia mentions to Sterling this update that she would like to take it slow to take time and explore, this is after Sterling fucks Ophelia in the pussy for the time and goes wild. So at the end of the update she wants to take it slow.

Here I would like to point out on how MC and Brenna's story was written and how it played out, that was the example for a good story, MC and Brenna had their ups and downs, they both have good number of scenes together, good relationship building moments when Brenna is first taken by MC in chapter 9, her dates with MC and Eva, Catherine setting up dinner for them, they watching movies together etc.; Judging this story and how Ophelia was written with Sterling is not fair, and the payoff is clearly seen missing in chapter 12, where it wasn't worth delaying the sex route with Ophelia, since solo sex scenes are skipped and she is forced into unwanted threesomes where clearly more solo scenes could have provided more bonding between MC and her in the coming update i.e. chapter 12.

Coming to the chapter 12 Ophelia contents, Ophelia's 63/64 night event, sex scene was entirely skipped and Sterling and Ophelia were talking post sex and to tease the vanilla fans she mentions want to go another round and it cuts to black and shows 5 hours later... {[wonder if same happened with her bad ends, where sex is skipped // of course not, in that path women are lusting over cocks and make the weirdest/sexiest faces and jump on dicks]}; it was entirely uncalled for and her talk with Sterling was shown, post that during Mallory and Aliza's threesome a tease for Sterling and Ophelia was shown of a single render, then Mallory and Aliza's 3some happened.

Ophelia had 3 vanilla scenes in the chapter 12 update, one really short riding for Sterling, that was thrown as a bone to Vanilla fans, that alright, you'll get something, but don't ask for much... and the other were threesome with Flora and Brenna, both were missionary positions for her, watching Sterling do the nasty and she didn't get any solo screen time with Sterling, I mean after chapter 11, she really needs some more solo scenes with Sterling, since she ended the note with saying that they need to experience things together and in the last couple of scenes in chapter 11; vaginal sex started, but in chapter 12 they jumped to 3somes quickly.. it's just shocking that Ophelia and Sterling have only one kiss animation, that too was there in chapter 9 when she was in her dom phase. It's visible as to how much less efforts are taken on the vanilla path story building with Ophelia and MC.

When chapter 13 drops don't know if it'll be the last or not but then with Anabelle coming back into their homes and Catherine being pregnant, Ophelia and Sterling will only have more story focused content like the night event 63/64 where they talk more and have sex less since he's has a good boy image, so he will help the entire main cast cope up with all that's been happening in the next chapter with Hunter drugging them and Anabelle showing up.

Honestly, if you're playing this for Brenna and MC for the Vanilla path then it's worth, but if you had your eyes set on Ophelia and MC then would suggest to skip this one... I may revisit this one if changes are made in chapter 13.

In my opinion Ophelia needs more solo long sex scenes {at least 4} with Sterling for the story to do justice, because this sort of payoff with Ophelia for MC just having couple of pussy banging scenes and jumping to random threesomes, is not a good way to go.

Honestly, this is good, but it leaves me a bit mixed.

The game has a boring premise that is made more interesting by the existence of your lecher grandpa who wants to be the MC of the story and indulge in the haremesque "landlady and roommates" fun that our MC inevitably will put himself into. It makes the game interesting in a weird way.

The art of the game is rather decent (though facial expressions can feel off to some and I feel a distinct lack of movement in their faces on the render when speaking); it's by no means bad and while some points may not be for everyone's tastes, I think it's a very safe spot where it is both conventionally decent while also having a very unique direction that creates its own style.

The lack of sound other than the main menu bothers me a bit, but nothing major.

The main issue with this is the writing. The writing is... well, it's fun. At the start. It's filled with weird innuendos and jokes between the characters who are all weird and quirky in their own way - and it's kinda funny at the start, honestly. But it oversaturates fucking fast. Like, really fast. There's only so many times I can read euphemisms about fucking and cumming from the characters banters before it kinda loses its luster. It becomes this weird aspect of the game where it's like it's wasting textboxes to try to make me laugh when I kinda just want to get on with the story. This is made worse by the fact that the main way to progress the game is through following repeated events until they progress slowly towards a variation or a new event; at the start, the writing was nice to read and it felt like it was growing on me, but doing the repeated events eventually derailed into me wanting to get rid of a couple characters existence entirely because I couldn't stand their quirky dialogues and personality(Catherine, mostly).

That, paired with really bad spacing of these events on the time-system in game, lower my enjoyment. If you put a time system in your game and I'm gated from moving forward with content because I need to regularly keep skipping time for the one thing that I need to do, you fucked up in your balancing of events somewhere, dude.

Other than these two gripes, the game is good. Not the type of game to binge through, given the writing will start grating on you, but it's still a nice game. Ironic, because until the relationship between the characters actually start happening, it's a very slow burn.

Best game in the world. I don't have any criticism. Thank you for the great work you did. I loved both the plot and the characters. I think the animations are great. I hope that in the future they can evolve their games much more.

Came for the porn, stayed for the writing (and the porn, who am I kidding).
Honestly, there have been very few porn games that have made me laugh so much, and believe me, I have played a LOOOT of porn games in the last couple of decades. References to popular culture, movies, and fuck me, even philosophy kept me googling things I found picked my curiosity.
The models and animations are really good. OK. facial expressions may not be for everybody, but all in all I would put them towards the top of the scale.
I downloaded it a few versions ago, saw the assets, saw the girls with the grandpa and assumed it was another NTR game with an ugly fuck, and left it to check other games. Nothing can be further from the truth. Yes, the ugly fuck is trying to nail the girls, but the only times it happens is in the non-canonical part of the story. IF you choose wrong (or right, depends what tickles your fancy) the ugly fuck nails the girls. Otherwise, he is just trying... And if he nails the girls it immediately jumps to the part where you made the wrong (or right) choice and you can be the one nailing her.
The story is pretty silly, but it is a game that it is not taking itself seriously.
What I can say about the plot is that it is really well written, with plenty of humour (I was laughing out loud in quite a few occasions).
All in all, I would REALLY recommend this game. It has 5 stars and 300+ reviews for a reason. (at least in chapter 12)

I just finished the chapter 12 and i first played the game back in 2021. If you had asked me then i would have given a 5star.

I was enjoying this game so much until the dev released the first what-if (i believe it was chapter 7-8) and then he kept releasing what-ifs, since then the main game kinda got down towards a strange road. Until then, dev seemed to love his own game as well and wanted to keep it inside his own preferations, keep it clean, story-focused. Rest of the review will explain what i mean.
(STORY):
The main story of the game is that the mc (sterling) competes with the old man(hunter) at who is going to get more girls. Hunter isnt appealing so he uses other unethical ways to do so, and the mc has to do it with other more ethical ways.

(FIRST PLAYTHROUGH-NTR CONTENT):
When i first played the game i saw the NTR disable option, but i didnt know what NTR was since im not an english native speaker and didnt bother changing it as i thought i might lose content. As you have already understood from the other reviews the game is kinetic which means you cant affect the story by choices. At some points tho you would have to choose between two options. This is why i was tricked at first. I remember the first time i saw a NTR scene by accident because i chose the wrong option for Eva(Brenna's friend) and then would proceed to see hunter getting his way with her. I was disappointed but at the same time liked the game a bit more. Because after the scene there was a narrator(robot) message "oh no, hunter stole one from you" or something like that. Which made the whole story(the competition between hunter-mc) more visible. I thought back then that since he stole a girl from me i wouldnt be able to have more scenes with the girl, which would raise my hatred towards him and would be beneficial to the game as it lead to a better "justice state" when sterling was the one to get a girl.(ofc i would load save to not lose to him but only the idea that i could pick a wrong choice would make the game far more interesting). I kept loading my saves if i lost a girl to hunter because im not into NTR stuff at all, in fact i hate them, and when i found out that my choice wouldnt matter at all i got disappointed, but not to the point that i wouldnt like the game.

All this changed after the release of the first what-if because the NTR option would now not be just a simple fuck, but it would progress as a story line. Even non-canonical it ruined the image of the girls and even the entire game's story in my head, not exclusively because of the what-ifs(which were basically NTR expands from the main story and they are connected to an extend), but also because the dev kept releasing the new chapters' NTR with story of its own just like the what-ifs.

ALL IN ALL, what i want to say about NTR is that in the beggining the NTR was just a simple fuck, which would just make your hatred towards hunter rise(which in my opinion is beneficial to the story), and after the whatifs the NTR scenes had their own "ending" with pregnant shit and making mc a BIG loser generally(You play as the mc so you are the loser I HATED THAT). At that point i kept playing the game only for the scenes and lost complete interest on the story. I understand that most patreons are NTR fans, and dev tried succesfully to keep the game in the lines of "canonicality" till the checkpoint of the first what-if, but in the end as it seems money won and he went full on NTR, which i dont hate him for since i would probably have done the same. Its just that for the non NTR fans it ruined the game.

Now for the non-NTR-story related content.
(WRITING):
His writing is insane, the best of all the games i have played. These lines that connect the game to the real world in a humorous style is just so good. Even while in a sex scene i think it makes it seem more casual as the characters are now really close enough to be joking while doing the deed. I had my laughs at times, which i really appreciated in a porn game. To not enjoy a game just for its porn.
(SCENES):
Sex scenes are pretty decent, really good quality, the only thing that i kinda didnt like is the non-succesfull attempt to make "sexy faces". It lead more often to uncanny valley than sexy.
(PROGRESS SPEED):
Many reviews hated the slow progress with the girls, but i presonally like it. Its one of the things i also appreciate. I dont mind getting a bit blue balled for a while if it makes it more realistic. Wouldnt it be really unrealistic if the mc fucked his family members in just 3 meetings? It also made me notice that this little detail would make me appreciate the low intimacy scenes ( clothed shit, handjobs, etc), whereas in other games i would straight up wait for the "good shit".
(MY ADVICE):
Play the game if you'd like to chapter 8 for the story, then if you want more scenes play the rest, but dont expect the story to end up to your liking.

The game's not terrible overall. It's an extremely on-the-rails VN with decent animations & CG.

I have two complaints that keep me from enjoying this one as an adult game. The first is the writing. Dear god, why does every sex scene feel like all the involved characters are engaged in a competition to see who can put out more Marvel-esque one-liners? It's sex, not standup comedy. The writing can really make or break an adult VN, and while a chunk of it is funny here, it's about as far from sexy as it's possible to be. Keep the comedy out of the scenes.

The second complaint is the decision for facial expressions. the younger sister is the biggest offender here. She already looks like a gremlin 2/3 of the time, why make it worse by making her make ridiculous faces? And don't get me started on the ridiculous ahegao faces they try to shoehorn into every seen - you know the kind, it's not "fucked silly" like it's intended to be, it's more of the influencer-esque "look as dumb as fucking possible" face.

Overall a shame, because there's not enough games that are actually content-rich like this (even if it did take four years).

I really like this game and it had a good amount of content up to this latest release. Humor was my favorite part and got some pretty good laughs out of it. glad NTR wasnt a big thing in the game and really looking forward to more.

This is peak. You won't find many games better than this. While the story is alright, the scenes are absolutely amazing. You live with you younger and older sister as well as your mother and you progress in their storylines and unlock more and more scenes. There's a ton of content and the game is still being updated (extremely slowly). There's content for all kinds of people and avoidable NTR (you can turn it off before the game starts). There's also side stories you can download that are pretty good and dive into more genres. Please play this game.