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

I've stuck with this game for a little over a year and a half. Probably seen three or four, possibly five updates over that period. I've never been disappointed with any update over that time. This game has clever, humorous writing, gorgeous models, and high-end animations. The plot is interesting and easy to follow. I also love the fact that the main character is trying to protect the women he cares about from falling prey to a shady, old, nasty villain who plays a considerable role in the lives of these women. It allows for some entertaining and consequential scenarios. This game has a little bit of everything as far as sexual content. I see it as a pretty well-rounded game with lots of twists and turns. I also appreciate the fact that the developer is somewhat interactive with his patreons and fans by allowing feedback and ideas about side stories and scenarios. The 'What If' mini episodes are just as well done as the original game and provide for additional sexy content and animations that fans perhaps wanted to see in the original game. The characters have depth and slowly develop into a relationship with the main character. I prefer that to games that quickly develop into a porn movie scenario. It's a great game and I recommend it to anyone who is searching for a fun story, sexy models, and above average animations. Even with a low 4 rating, this game still feels quite underrated to me. The developer is doing an amazing job with this project and it has been extremely worth getting involved with this one.

This game is absolutely ridiculous. The conceit is absurd. The silliest situations and character quirks are played (mostly) straight as if they were normal. Many of the characters start as being stereotypes or seemingly superficial as the horny one, the lonely one, the naïve one, etc.

All that said, this game (as of Ch. 9) contains the single most meaningful/earned "I love you" that I think I've ever felt in a game like this, despite everything leading up to it and after it feeling incredibly silly. I don't often think of games like this when I'm not playing them, but that moment was in my head for days. Five stars.

the best F95 game, no doubt!
The modeling of the characters, the story and gameplay of the game are excellent, and so far, the game is rich in content, completely in my taste. The only catch is that the update interval is a bit long, which is understandable, because each update is very rich in content, and the story is driven by ups and downs!
For now, I just want WWG to finish the game, I don't care how long I wait, I want to see a happy ending!

Funniest game ive ever played XD. I cant count how many screenshots ive taken of the dialogue just to look at later and crack up all over again. Im not a huge fan of hyper attractive big breasted models, i prefer a more natural look, but these characters incredible and unique personalities just make you fall in love with them. I also love the slow burn of building intimacy as the the family members arent automatically on board with the idea of incest like some poorly written porno. You as the mc have to actually work to convince them which feels so much more real and rewarding. The sex scenes are fantastic and although id love there to more rauchy kink stuff like dom/sub, foot fetish, watersports, sweat/bo etc, (it has a small amount already but im just a freak) the game is phenomenal for what it is. 10/10 fantastic work

I have so many mixed feelings on this game, I ended up deleting this review, but I still have some small ideas that mostly define my mixed predicament:

The girls are hot. The situations are hot. The will-they-won't-they-incest dance is fun as hell. There are some very well written moments. There's fun to be had, there's some edging / wanking to be done.

But the porn is veeeeeeryyyy poor (and I'm being quite generous here). If you like EDGING, there's a lot. If you want hardcore fucking, bad news. What there is, is shit.

The writing is great AT TIMES. But it very much overstays its welcome.Most characters in this game have a shared personality and sense of humor. But in an un-natural way. They aren't distinct characters half of the time. Just the same character talking with himself. But at other times it's okay. Essentially the banter is completley hit or miss. You never know if it will be okay or not.

Also, this is a relatively serious game. Relatively. Not completley. But like, the mom is ping-ponging every-which way. Does she have a predefined personality or is it a situational mold? I can't tell but leaning on mold.

Characters wanna jump your cock one minute, but don't wanna push things too far the next. But several times over. The boring cliche, stretched over chapters and repeated.

I honestly don't know what people are smoking when they say the story is amazing. Half of it is amazing, half of it is complete trash. But it's not a "wait, it gets good". No, it's ping-pong. Good, bad, good, bad, great, terrible, hilarious, cringe-coma.

EDIT: Ah, and the MC is a complete wet noodle. And being self aware, in the story, that the MC is terrible, does not actually make him less terrible.

As a general rule, i do love corruption story and played a lot of them. This game is higher tier !

WOW, so much good things to say so i gonna start with the negatives.

1: Hunter is so awfull and ugly. I appreciate the NTR part but that's a difficult task to enjoy thoses scenes.

2: Need some variations in the scenes. You can't have the same scene for 9 chapters long. I think about the breakfast scene or the clean up just after where you have always the same 2 girls with the same dialogues for 9 CHAPTERS LONG!!!

3: The long hose, which serve the MC, of dick is leaking too much. That's generally disgusting according to me.


So about the positives:

1: Smooth, well written, the story is great. There's a lot of dialogue and it add personalities to characters. The transformation of the MC is so progressive and interesting i do love it.

2: The females are nice, the sex scene awesome and the ahego is mastered! This game is one a few i got hard playing so success?

3: The help about events is a model to follow for others games. You find all the events every chapter quite easily that's so refreshing!

4: The NTR game over scenes are incredible! Like i said i wish hunter be someone different but this gameplay is absolutely incredible. No kidding, i surprised myself waiting for it each chapters!!! To see the face of the girls and the act!

I love this game congrats that's awesome i recommend!

Man, what a great game.

The last what if... (6) made me wanna write the review. it was an amazing extra content.

The first time I played, the obligation of having to take the good option made me a little pissed off. Afterwards I was not disappointed. I have mixed feelings about this mechanic. On the one hand yes, it is NTR, but it just ends up being in all cases a scene that has no repercussions, there is no "ntr path" because the game says that what you have seen is not canon and takes you back in time . There is only the harem path and a peak of what could have happened if you make a mistake (which the game makes it clear to you that it does not happen, that is a bit of a turn off for me). Even so, it manages to mix a game very well for ntr fans as well as for ntr haters.
I may have liked more to see a variety of paths (for example Ntr, harem and even sharing path, cause i liked Hunter and I would love to make an agreement to share the girls with him). But i have to admit that it's good the way it is, and the what if short stories fills that space very well.

everything else is outstanding, the models, the animations (good ass animations), even the story and the dialogues are very well done, with funny moments here and there.

Hope to see more main story and what if stories with hunter and ophelia (and catherine of course).

Easy 5 stars. I highly recommend to invest in this game, I myself gonna donate now. this game and his dev definitely deserves it. Good luck!!

Revised review for Chapters 1-10

Started out pretty good, bit of a grind to get the ball rolling as per usual with these type of games. In the beginning there was a bit of a corruption vibe and the "non-canon" stuff was sold as bad ends and came off pretty comedically, that feeling sort of shifts as the game goes on. Thankfully it is toggleable and as someone who hates ntr/cuckold content it was very much appreciated. However as the project grew in scope and quality the time between updates increased. I wanted to see all that PV had to offer, the ntr scenes definitely seemed like they got more production value than the main scenes and kind of made it seem like the goal rather than the consequence, seeing as how the ntr antag gets vaginal sex with the main girls before the mc.

It has your quasi-sandbox click on rooms with icons in it and repeat tasks a number of times with some unique scenes thrown in in to gradually advance the story. The pacing is terrible, normally in these types of game you have your typical flirt>kiss>touching>oral>sex type deal and for the most part that's true, but the MC doesn't get any main girl penetration til seven chapters in. The same is not true of the "alternate paths" the first sex scene in the game is one of the bad ends (in chapter 2) and as mentioned before with 1 exception the ntr has vaginal with every main girl before the mc, again they are avoidable and non-canon as in they don't ever actually happen as far as the story is concerned, but an example of extreme pacing issues. Not to mention how padded the game gets by the time you get to chapter 10 with all sorts of side girls and characters to continue the blueballing with the main girls.

Another testament to the pacing is 10 chapters in and I counted about 14 full scenes(not all vaginal mind you, there are probably a couple arguably are not full scenes) with the 3 main girls. If you only count vaginal there are a whopping 7 vaginal scenes, mind you about 9 of these 14 scenes came in chapters 9 and 10 with 10 being by far and away the most full scenes with the main girls yet. By full scene I mean more than one sexual activity or scenes with buildup and escalation

The proportions and faces are for the most part attractive, there are definitely some characters that range from kind of odd looking to outright disgusting. The render quality until about chapter 9 isn't the best and there are definitely some glaring issues, mostly in the earlier chapters, such as several transitions meant to emphasize some facial expression that end up taking quite a while to load and move in slow motion. But in the latest few chapters renders and animations got a major upgrade.

Certain aspects run very dry after a while, there is a constant running theme throughout the game of characters interrupting scenes and their personalities shifting. A near constant push-pull where you get to or past a certain level in a relationship and they become hesitant to do it again or advance further or they/another character have a sudden personality shift and the interrupting commences. Basically tons of blueballing the mc. Frankly the mc doesnt even start getting good scenes with the main girls til chapter 7 which is when the first penetration happens.

There is some comedic writing sprinkled in here and there but YMMV as to how funny you find it, sometimes it most certainly gets a bit wordy and the characters can come off as having the exact same personalities/sense of humor/taboos with the obvious exceptions of when they have super dramatic personality shifts seemingly random. The younger sister starts off a curious innocent girl and by the time you get to the end she's a complete horndog. The mom has several massive personality shifts as well being a normal mom to a sub then a dom and all sorts of stuff in between.

All in all it's a halfway decent game, doesn't break any molds or anything and there is certainly some disturbing content and some questionable dev practices, but definitely worth a few faps if nothing else. But the laundry list of complaints I and many others have with pacing, blue balling, focus on the nasty old guy getting all the good scenes, until recently not so good renders and an overall lack of sense of direction the game has, It's a skip-through looking for booba scenes type of game. There is a reason the most liked reviews are the negative/mixed ones

The following is my old review for chapter 1-9 and is for posterity. Upon further review I've changed some of my thoughts

time to rate this. I was trying to wait until it was done.
but with "what if..6" I just thought. thats it, I don't need to be convinced anymore.
so, what if..6 is the best of "what ifs" so far, and this little gem was very well done, erotic and hot and lots of animations. this standalone story deserve a 5 on its own.

so, the main game, even if sandbox, its manageable, its intuitive and u can not get stuck. u can just look at the list of todo, and u can focus on that. good in-game help I would say.

the game has that "if wrong choice, u get a ntr-scene and game-over that instead returns u to the choice before" and u can select the "right one".
I always thought, this game is a solid 4 star. good story, good models,funny, and hot scenes. but I always felt, I wanted more Hunter, and the what if is that. they complete the story, giving me that part I missed in the vanilla game. so, from a 4 to a 5 star.

now, I do hope the what if.. will continue for a long time, giving me lots of hot scenes with Hunter and the girls. this is the perfect "ugly" and "beauty" theme we have.

First off, most of the models and visuals look really good. They are probably better than most of the other 3d porn games out there. So if you are playing these games solely for visuals, this is a good one to check out.

However, the rest of the game's construction is why I only gave this three stars. Game play consists of clicking different room icons during different times of the day, clicking through repetitive scenes, and doing it all the next day. Progression moves at a glacial pace, and even after almost three years of development, most characters do not have proper/traditional sex scenes with the MC. Many scenes that look like they are going somewhere end up with some kind of cockblock. I feel like the developers are trying too hard to please both NTR and non-NTR crowds with content such as the "What If" series, which severely limits the rate at which other types of content can be implemented.

The biggest offender of grinding progress to a halt is the younger sister character Catherine. Every time it looks like H-scene progress is about to be made, this character butts in with some unfunny dialogue. It was funny the first time, but each time this situation happens it becomes more annoying. This is personal taste, but as I find her model to be the worst looking, her character feels like a total waste and detriment to the game, and her sex scenes should have gone to another character with better results.

Finally, while the dialogue is pretty clever and funny at times, it gets overwhelming and a little annoying after a while. It feels like every piece of dialogue is set up for some pun, gag, or obscure word play. The story is a comedy first and foremost, but over stuffing it with quips has resulted in severely diminishing returns for me. Eventually it gets grating enough that skipping through it doesn't feel like a loss of meaningful content.

Give the game a shot for sure, but don't feel guilty about Ctrl-skipping your way through a lot of the dialogue and content milking.

This review is for Chapter 9 + What If 1-5

I honestly could have dismissed this game after the first few clicks. As it's one of those games that repeat itself until you can move on after doing everything in the Chapter. And I had my fair share of those games and they're usually tedious grinding repeating everyday to do something to progress. It is in no way comparable to other games that are story centric and the narrative moves on with every click. This is more like a mini game of trying to bang your family while stopping other men from banging them. Story is more like a structure or a premise just so you know what the fuck is happening. I also advise everyone to patch this game with the Incest patch because that is way better than the warden shit that is just clearly a way to circumvent Patreon's Rules.

With that said the best thing I like about this game is the sense of humor, Catherine is the best in that regards. She's just this innocent to an idiotic degree funny. I can't remember how many times I LOLed because of her. Aside from the humor I also like the NTR, which I get, not everybody would like. I do like Hunter especially when he's your gramps and not just a random warden which is fucking weird. One thing I dislike about VN games is that most MCs are perfect fucking machines and barely have any rivals. How good would it be if BADIK has Hunter in it wreaking havoc in B&R? Instead you got fucking Tybalt and Chad who doesn't really pose any threats to MC of that game. But I digress, I just appreciate the addition of a malevolent force that can actually do harm to your harem even though you'll be forced to go back to the past to undo it.

Fappability is high because that is the main selling point of this game and in my opinion, it delivers.

Story is low, there isn't much. Just like the first Super Mario that doesn't really tell you why mario is chasing down peach when you power up the game. He just does, deal with it.

User Interface, it works.

5 Stars for the laughs and the bodily fluids.

Fappability - 9/10
Story - 4/10
User Interface - 7/10

Hunter is an Over the top vile old man (seriously disgusting)
moves in with your “step”-mom/sisters. Dad died and left them deep in debt and hunter is exploiting this by renting a room in their house while planning to exploit their emotional vulnerability over the death of father/husband to fuck and chuck them. His intent is explicitly malicious and scummy.

MC comes up with the brilliant plan of stopping Hunter by seducing the girls first into an incesteous relationship.
You also use a bunch of cruel and frankly hilarious methods to sabotage the old man like spiking his food with ipecac, making his hearing aid overload, messing with the drugs he feeds your sister so that she punches his teeth out instead of fucking him, etc.
Also will acquire a few other girls who are not your family to round up the harem later on.

The MC's explicit goal in the game is to avoid getting NTRed. He is building harem and defending it very aggressively.
The actual plot is linear and the True plot is one where you successfully defend your harem. The game has two modes of play
[NTR on] mode you are allowed to fail, resulting in a “bad end” NTR scene (which is gross because as mentioned he is extremely vile and decrepit looking. Hunter makes a pig orc look handsome in comparison) followed by automatic time travel back to when you made the mistake so you can pick the correct choice.
[NTR off] mode disables your ability to click on dumb choices in the first place so you always succeed in protecting your harem.

The game is a bit slow, but not exactly grinding. Rather each scene is small incremental progress with unique dialog.
Most of the humor is slapstick with varying degree of funny. Some of it is just cringe though. Such as bashing other games in the genre while still falling into the same foibles.

MC starts out as a wussy shrimp meant to invoke shota. With the mom having a giantess build.
After a week of excercise MC mysteriously grows a foot taller and transforms from a shrimp into an adonis with the physique of a body builder.
Then his mother accidentally breaks his penis and through a convoluted scenario it heals bigger, becoming a bitch breaker.
This is, technically, not a retcon.

DEAR GOD WHYYYYYY?!??!
*takes a deep breath*

So this review is for the Chapter 9 version since the What Ifs are just optional side pieces of content.

Aight, so. The GAME!
I have had a hard time finding anything wrong with this game. Over all this is a great sandbox visual novel. The renders COULD be better, but it more than makes up for it with its Unique models in the game... Seriously, I haven't seen anything more grotesque than Hunter.... God he's ugly! The animations can be a bit of a hit and miss mainly, because of how much work was put into each of them.

But the scenes??? They are pretty damn good which is what really keeps me coming back to this game. Whether it's whaching something as grotesque or hot, you are going to keep coming back to replay these scenes.

I also have no complaints about the story. It definitely keeps you engaged with it's humor and it's characters. Even the NTR scenes are well written to where you can't help, but giggle a bit. I just wish there were a couple of NTR scenes that take Hunter out of the picture all together were canon.

So uhh... yeah. Peep this game yo! Along with it's side content (AT YOUR OWN RISK!).

One of the best games on the site if not the best, Great writing, gameplay is pretty straightforward once you pick up how it plays out. The sex scenes at the beginning of the game were average but have greatly picked up as the chapters get higher and higher.

When i first started playing the game, it had a nice plot, sexy, funny scenes, good humor, banter, and this "corruption" feeling, that you can enjoy in a good game...
But then it got worse, and worse... Corruption was replaced by pounding, and there was not that many good scenes...
Models are still ok but they feel like a bit rushed, in compare to earlier releases.
NTR... Not a big fan, I dont mind, but to spend most time on rendering side stories (maybe for top tier patrons...) damaged the image of the main game. And i mean it... Played 2 what if, ald left it there.

This game is slow to progress with sex but gives a lot of time to bind with the LI so its dialogue heavy. now to do what I never thought I'd do and defend NTR.
I'll start by saying that I'm not a fan of NTR but if you want the most out of this game you'll want to leave it enabled, most of the NTR scenes are over the top and with the game dev making a joke then pausing and rewinding to before your bad decision it kind of feels like a dream scenario, it also reaffirms that what the MC is doing is important and that he's protecting his family. the only 2 scenes that I really felt were too much were Brenna CH7 and sleepover CH9 since if felt like more of an emotional NTR.
Another thing to factor in about this game is that most of it is foreplay, dialogue, and binding with the LI and penetrative sex takes a pretty long time to come around, so without the NTR you end up with foreplay for a very long time, I actually think this slow approach to the LI is a good thing since it gives a chance to get to know them and care for them , it also make certain acts much more meaningful like a certain blowjob, if you play this you would probably know which one I'm taking about.
Also if you don't like how the MC looks he'll get better over time, I didn't like how he looked at the beginning too
not a good review since I dint actually talk about the game but oh well, just know its a great game and worth playing

It's generally a nice game. Decent renders, pretty girls and good dialogues. However there are two huge cons which ruin the game completely.

1. Way too much cock teasing. Imagine ordinary relationship path in any other porn game. First you get girl undressed, then handjob > boobjob > blowjob > oral sex > vaginal > anal etc. Now imagine you have to repeat every activity 10-20 times with a slightly different dialog to progress to the next step. Yeah, that what Power Vacuum is.
2. So, you've repeated handjob session 20 times and want to progress to the next step. Can you? No! You can't progress the game with only girls you like, you have to progress with all of them at the same time. So, to unlock the next level first make 15 foot massages with another character and so on and so on. I hate Kate's and especially Lucia's paths yet I had to play it to progress with other girls.

The game really should be like 3x times shorter. This endless cock teasing is just tiresome. Reading walls of text to only see the same animation 20 times is no fun. Honestly, I skipped all dialogues in the last 3 chapters to only see sex scenes. I hope someone will upload Ophelia sex scenes to the Pornhub, because there's no way I will play it again.

NOTE: I only played this once and will again when I have time and change review if necessary.

Lets start with good stuff first!

Massive amounts of content, and it is funny without having to rely on obnoxious sound effects too much. Also, it has taken a risk with its story, I will not spoil but all can say is it does not do the same cookie-cutter BS and most other games and actually tries to stand out from the crowd. I don’t mind the NTR. +3

Cons

The bodies of the characters do not look good at all! The breasts look super weird. The dialogue can seem a little off but this only happens sometimes. The renders are poor. This is a very important aspect of a 3D game on renpy. The models look very low quality.

This is a great fucking game. It's hilarious, looks pretty good and features some simply excellent writing. I'm not overly fond of sandbox games, but this one avoids a lot of the pitfalls of the genre. It's not very grindy, there's no money to worry about (except in a story sense) and no dumb minigames. I was also never left baffled about how to advance a character's story, it's fairly straightforward and the game offers hints if you need them. The LIs are hot, but some have somewhat ludicrous dimensions going on. All in all, if you somehow haven't played this yet, do yourself a favor and fix that!

Almost a masterpiece!

This is a gem of the adult VN community.
The teasing, the humor and the facial expressions are on spot.

Each and every character is unique, with well-developed personality traits and well understood profiles. The only downside I see here is that, while well developed and unique, they are also ridden with a great deal of similarities - mainly their mannerism and quick wit almost being genetically passed down.
Unless intended, this is hard for a single author to notice or escape from, which is why a good editor could do wonders for some counter-play and advice. But this is where my criticism ends.

I applaud the developer/author for doing something I rarely give kudos for here on F95 - and that is delivering a proper easy to follow plot with a ton of supporting- and original sub-plots. The banter is enjoyable and funny. Each character is developing and growing, not to mention the MC *wink wink*.

Playing this game in the later hours of the evening has almost become a minor ritual for me. Especially since I wish to end every day on a positive note in order to steer clear from any depressive triggers.

I wish to thank @What? Why? Games for letting me enjoy the world and characters they have created. You have my utmost respect and gratitude.
Keep adding, keep making and expanding to this wonderful quirky family.

P.S. I love the optional NTR. I rather have it off.