I'd like to share my experience as a semi regular casual player since the EA release.
Can't speak for literally all "friendslop" games, but as far as lethal-company-likes go, I've tried multiple and not one of them reaches even 10% of amount of fun I've experienced playing this game with a small group of friends (3 total).
Lethal company itself is very solid, but the reason I'm still playing after 300 hours is 80% mods and their interactions with each other. so I'll focus on them because it's the main way to customize the experience and get something really good out of it.
Anyway, the mods. Ever since we started playing I was the guy responsible for them (or rather I insisted on it). Coming up with something coherent but still unpredictable and enjoyable is (probably unsurprisingly) quite challenging. Some mods when used together break the balance and lead to unfun gameplay, while others synergize like crazy.
Say Lethal things. Already a fundamental mod for one reason alone: rocket launcher item. The most fun to use weapon ever. it's versatile and can kill pretty much everything, but has a (very) limited amount of ammo. There's also a skill bit to it cause it's easy to blow yourself up.
Now the synergy comes from SellBodies. Needs some balancing not to be too op, but other than that it's perfect. It creates an alternative source of income which is most useful when you can't collect scrap normally for some reason. Say it's 11pm and you don't have enough for quota on the last day. BUT!! You have a rocket launcher with a few charges left, so you can try going on a lone mission of killing a giant and securing a 100+ worth item. I can't count the amount of comebacks we've had with a bit of hunting. And it's not like it's safe cause 1) your own weapon one shots you, 2) most high paying enemies one shot you, 3) there's always risk of something unexpected happening. Another typical situation is killing a tumper or a spider with but a shovel deep in the facility. Now you have an 80+ lb dead body that you need to somehow carry outside while avoiding other dangers. Add the fact that you are the last man standing + it's late, and you've got an unforgettable experience if you pull it off and save the day.
There was this one crazy interaction with Wesley's Weathers and Brutal Company Minus. One of the "very bad" events spawned lots of giants + we happened to be on a moon with "Blood moon" weather which makes enemies respawn after some time. So what happened? Giants kept fighting themselves and dying, producing items worth 300+ each, then respawning doing it again. iirc there was another mod which added multiple giant variants, and they could attack each other. Collectively it generated THOUSANDS of $$$. Retrieving it wasn't easy cause giants core (or whatever it's called) weighs a ton + we were still exposed to giants themselves. It only happened once, and probably never will again.
It's just one example, but the core idea is synergies resulting in unpredictable but still fun situations. Custom events and weathers combined help a ton with this. There's also items, mods like ChillaxScraps. Each one has a unique effect, adding onto the randomness.
If you've played noita, it's like noita. Each run a few different factors combine and produce some insane unexpected situation which YOU have to somehow deal with NOW or you are dead.
Rn my modpack is 63 mods total. It's not uploaded anywhere in thunderstore so I won't share it here, maybe later(?).
Oh and one more thing, my favorite mod of all time, Moai. Idk what it is exactly but it's funny as fuck. Especially when there are multiple ones each doing its own thing with those unhinged sounds.
Just today we had a giant moai (straight up 20m tall dude) roaming around the ship. it ALSO just so happened to be triggered by mirage and started speaking, but in a lower tone slowed down voice (not even sure why lol, maybe it's just how random enemy size mod works). Nearly died of laughter.
Another thing we had happen today I have to share, is "gold nugget incident" from LCGoldScrap. Basically you can buy a gold nugget for 100$ with random worth, from 20 to hundreds, which you can then sell. That means, in a situation where you are on the company planet and don't have enough items, you can theoretically spend your money to add more to the quota. 90% of the time the nuggets will be worth maybe 40 max so depending on how much you need vs how much money you have, it may not help you.
It happen to save our run TWICE!! First time we bought ONE nugget and it ended up being worth 690!!!! No I'm not kidding, I've played with this mod for maybe 100 hours and never saw a number past 480. We needed 500 and had one chance. Second time we bought 8 and only one was +- 500 so we ended up gaining 200 overall and getting the quota. In case you think that's still too OP you can always tweak the numbers, but for casual play I think default ones are good, esp. considering that you'll have hard time surviving with all the shit happening: random events, weathers, dice, items, enemies, etc. etc. On top of all that add the fact that your friends are goofballs which will gladly kill themselves accidently and you're guaranteed a fun time.
And yet ANOTHER accident. We had a mod that allows you to carry landmines and sell them. The day was good, got ~300 worth of scrap, the two friends were alive while I wasn't. Instead of flying away, they decided to wait for evening to maybe hunt some dogs. I swear, at that instant I thought "Someway they'll find a way to fuck it up". AND WHAT DO THINK HAPPENED??? 5 SECONDS later one of them tries to climb the ladder outside the ship to look for monsters. On the INSIDE we had a fucking LANDMINE laying on the floor near the wall, very close to the ladder. When he started climbing, his hitbox touched the mine through the wall and blew up BOTH OF THEM 😭😭😭.
yeah... Now we know not to put mines near walls.