Slash'EM Extended

SLASH'EM Extended - sometimes written as Slash'EM Extended, and also known as "Sadistic Levels of Endless X-Citement" (or SLEX for short) - is a variant of SLASH'EM version 0.0.7E7F2, created by the user known as Bluescreenofdeath (alternately AmyBSOD, or just Amy).

SLASH'EM Extended contains several new roles and races for the player to choose from, several new special levels, a lot of new monsters, and other changes. The main dungeon is even longer in Slash'EM Extended than in SLASH'EM, with the upper Dungeons of Doom being 50 levels in length followed by 50 levels of Gehennom, meaning that Moloch's Sanctum is on dungeon level 100. After claiming the Amulet of Yendor, the player also needs to complete a 100-level bonus dungeon before the actual ascension run begins, greatly increasing the length of the game.

But where many variants of NetHack tend to run with a different aspect of its Fantasy Kitchen Sink full of Anachronism Stew - such as EvilHack's focus on difficulty and adapting traits from Advanced Dungeons and Dragons - SLASH'EM Extended focuses on a few other things:


 * 1) Nothing is off limits. If Amy overhears an idea she likes, she'll Throw It In.
 * 2) Nothing is off limits. No matter how unusual, unorthodox, or downright weird, if she wants to add it, she'll find a way.
 * 3) Harder is better. The game is designed with the idea that the player should be in danger of dying at any moment, even in the late stages of the game.
 * 4) Unfair =/= unbalanced. Not every game will be 100% winnable; Amy is something of a stickler for preserving the more chancey elements of the game and considers SLEX players being screwed by the Random Number God fair play, since a similar element of risk exists in the base game.
 * 5) Unbalanced =/= unfair. On the other hand, she also does her best to make it so that the player has as many viable options as possible without one being overwhelmingly stronger than any of the others - traps and monsters with the most dangerous and game-ruining qualitieis are ideally extremely rare until the late game.
 * 6) You can never have enough fleecy bundles. No, really. Amy isn't shy about showing off her interests, as players will quickly discover.

The GitHub repository for SLASH'EM Extended shows all the individual changes applied since version v97. It can be played online at em.slashem.me and at hardfought.org; the former server also offers BIGslex, which is basically the same game as regular SLEX but with huge dungeon levels. SLASH'EM Extended can be downloaded for Windows via this link here.

The subreddit can also be used for discussion about the game, and Freenode has the channels #em.slash.me and #slashemextended among a few others for SLEX discussion.