HL Classic was used in my campaigns for as long as it's been around. It was so prevalent among my players, if HLC didn't have the item (and I bought into $$$ worth of Pathfinder supplements) the players couldn't have it. But the number one goal was for me to have a repository of everyone's sheets. With .POR files, this was possible.
Today as we play PF2E, I'm less likely to use HLO as it's a standalone tool; I can't import what the players have created. If I updated the player's sheets with XP, items, etc., I could send them their sheets. They were able to immediately import, view the changes, keep notes in the Hero Lab journals, and send it all back.
This isn't about 3rd party anything for me. It's about organization, ease of use, and portability.
In a world where most everything can be saved and imported, this was a backwards step for Lone Wolf Dev and a rather surprising one at that.
Steve