The whole package is a standard mix of twin shooting and roguelite mechanics. You control something that looks like a bucket or a magician’s hat, but it is actually a drone that fires bullets. The type of projectile is selected before starting a run, but as is often the case with these games, everything is locked at first, so you are stuck with cannonballs.
The selection is fairly limited, with only five options, but unlocking them does not require much grinding. You only need to win a few games. Ironically, the cannonballs turn out to be the best choice, as the later weapons are neither particularly effective nor fun to use.
The same applies to special powers, which are unlocked alongside weapons and also come in five variants. Special powers can be used freely, but each activation triggers a fairly long cooldown. Options include a tornado that pulls in and damages enemies, a volcano that explodes after a short time, and a few others.
The final choice is the stage. Since you must beat the current stage to unlock the next one, there is little reason to replay stages you have already completed. Difficulty is set to neutral by default, but you can adjust it up or down by several levels, with each level adding a modifier. Lower difficulties reduce slime health and enable auto healing, while higher levels make slimes more dangerous across the board. Although lower difficulties are available from the start, higher ones must be unlocked by clearing a stage on the highest difficulty currently available.
Gameplay is wave based, meaning you must defeat a set number of enemies to progress. After surviving a wave, you can choose one reward from a random selection of three. These rewards include various perks, such as increased weapon damage, exploding slimes, mini turrets that act as secondary weapons, and more. Since the same perks can appear multiple times, it is possible to create nice builds. For example, while doubling the number of bullets significantly lowers damage, this drawback can be offset with perks that boost overall damage.
In practice, damage focused perks are far more important than speed. You want to kill a slime in one or two shots rather than ten weaker ones. Stages are small, and it is easy to become overwhelmed and surrounded because slimes keep spawning until their counter reaches zero.
If you do not like a perk, you get several chances to reroll the selection. You can also use a system called banish, which replaces a perk with a new one. Perks cost either one or two banishes. Since banishes are earned after clearing waves, you are usually only able to swap one perk unless you save them during the early waves.
As mentioned earlier, the only enemies are slimes, but they come in many variations. One splits into smaller slimes, another continuously spawns new ones, and another leaves behind a green puddle that slows your movement, among other behaviors.
One interesting twist is that you get to choose your opposition. Before each wave begins, you are presented with three enemy group options featuring different slime types. The option you choose is added to all previous selections, meaning future waves include everything you have picked so far. Choosing groups with fewer slimes can make things easier initially, but those slimes may be more dangerous.
After eight waves, you face a random boss to complete the stage. Win or lose, and regardless of which stage you are on, you always earn experience. This fills a progress bar that unlocks new perks, which can then appear in future runs. Everything, including slimes, bosses, and gear, can be reviewed from the main menu.
Overall, the game offers a lot for a very low price. It may not look like much at first, but it delivers solid gameplay, some fun perks, and a variety of extra options hidden in a not so secret menu that leans into experimentation, almost broken gameplay. These include modifiers that let all main and special weapons fire at once, extreme knockback that pushes you through the play area, or even an army of drones orbiting you that crashes the game after a few seconds.
There are also survival modes, where you can't fight and have to dodge slimes, and races that are a mess to play due to "traffic" or other slimes that make winning a chore. Judging by the achievements, there are also some secrets hidden in the game, but I wasn't able to spot them. They might be connected to the experimental features, but since those are not described, you have no clue what they do.
