True to its title, Hack Slash Loot is about as straightforward a rogue-like as you can find. After choosing a hero and a themed dungeon (Goblin fortress! Pharaoh's tomb! Dragon's lair!), you are given a paragraph of exposition and sent straight into mouse-clicky battle. Your goal? To reach the fifth floor of the dungeon and slay the boss monster. There's no leveling to speak of, no skills, no puzzles. Your choice of character only determines your starting gear and your proficiency with melee, ranged, or magic attacks, all of which function identically except that melee can only attack adjacent opponents. That isn't to say there's no strategy involved in the game; HP restoration is very limited, positioning in combat is crucial, and knowing what sorts of monsters and hazards each dungeon contains can make or break your survival. However, the primary method for improving your character is to loot the place, which means endlessly comparing your current items to every item drop you come across in the hopes that one of them might outperform your current outfit. If you're lucky, you'll find something early on which offers tons of resistances or one of the handful of special abilities that can easily carry you through to the end. If you're not lucky, well, keep dying, and eventually you'll turn up something nice.

In the end, HSL suffers from a crummy GUI, tedious mechanics, and a lack of variety in almost every field. It's perfectly playable, and winning is admittedly somewhat satisfying, but you can get better bang for your buck in plenty of other places.