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Calm MachinesA Lion's North company

Vacuum by Calm Machines

A game that just lets them vacuum.

Quiet motor sounds. A floor covered in dirt. One finger to move. When the room is clean, there is another room. I built it for my son, who is seven, autistic, and has loved vacuums since he was two. For some kids, that is everything.

View on App Store$4.99 once. No ads, ever.
A 3D render of a blue domed machine with black treads, yellow wheel hubs, yellow front brushes, a white corrugated hose, and a dark front panel with a light-blue status bar, set against a solid blue background

Why we build

This started with my son.

My son is seven. He has loved machines since he was two, vacuums first, then diggers, street sweepers, pool vacuums, lawnmowers, leaf blowers. At three he insisted on helping vacuum the floor, frightened of the machine and in love with it at the same time. He never grew out of it. On the days when everything is too loud, he drags the shop vac out, pours dirt on the ground, and vacuums it up again, and again, and again.

We went looking for a vacuum game for his iPad and found the same thing every time. Bright noise, ads between taps, a paywall sitting where the fun starts, controls that took more explaining than the game was worth. So I stopped looking and built the one he already had in his head.

One clear action. Soft sound. Nothing asking him for attention or money. A new room is ready to clean the second it ends. My son is the reason it exists, and he is still the only reviewer who matters.

I am not a scientist or a therapist. I am a father of children on the spectrum, building what I wish my son had years ago. Not science, just care.

First game, out now

Vacuum by Calm Machines

Simple, repetitive, soft. Six rooms in the house and six pools to clear. Move to the next room or re-clean the room you are in. Vacuum is where Calm Machines starts, not where it stops.

Soft, real vacuum sounds

Recorded low and warm, the way a motor sounds from the next room. No sudden noise, no harsh high frequencies, and one switch in the same corner of every screen when a child needs quiet.

A machine that belongs to them

Body, color, wheels, eyes, a hat if they want one. They name it. My son has rebuilt his more times than I can count, and that is half the game for him.

Easy to move

One finger, anywhere on the screen. No buttons to learn, no menus to get lost in, and every control stays exactly where it was the last time.

Dirt, then a clean floor

That is the whole game. Suck up the dirt, watch the floor go clear, move to the next room. One clear job, done properly, for as long as they like.

Repetition on purpose

The rules of the game never change and a new room is ready to vacuum the second one room is clean.

$4.99, once

I built this for one boy and never planned to sell it. Enough parents asked that it felt wrong to keep it. One small price, then it is yours, and nothing will ever ask your child to buy anything again.

What Calm Machines will never do

Every one of these is here because it was already in a game I handed to my son, and I had to take the iPad away.

  • No ads, of any kind
  • No paywalls or in-app purchases
  • No loot boxes or reward traps
  • No accounts or logins
  • No data collected from children
  • No timers, no lives, no game over

In the workshop

The machines my son asks for by name, and the ones other parents keep writing in about. Vacuum is just the first one out the door.

  • Street sweepers
  • Tornados
  • Whirlpools
  • Diggers
  • Leaf blowers
  • Lawnmowers

What is inside

The Vacuum title screen, with a green domed machine on a soft purple stage and two large buttons reading Play and Workshop
The workshop screen, where a red machine turns on a purple turntable while buttons for machine, colour, wheels, eyes, costume and mess let a child rebuild it
A wooden bedroom floor with a grey rug, scattered toys and trails of dirt, a red machine part way through clearing it
A tiled swimming pool floor with clumps of dirt, a red machine with a corrugated hose clearing them one patch at a time
A recording of the game as it plays on an iPad, from the title screen through the workshop and into a room.

FAQ

Get Vacuum by Calm Machines

$4.99, paid once. Everything inside it, open from the first tap.

View on App Store

Questions, a machine your child keeps asking for, or a clinic or classroom that wants it? info@lionsnorth.com

Calm Machines is play, not therapy. We make no clinical claims. A Lion's North company. Privacy policy