I really enjoyed this game... while it lasted that is.
I don't wanna sound ungrateful or anything, I know it's just two people making this game but I'm gonna be honest: 15k words is literally nothing. I know that this is partially because it's a kinetic novel, there are no alternative routes or anything and I don't even plan on complaining about that, I don't mind at all if the entire gameplay consists of quite literally nothing but progressing dialogue, it's just that this game has a play time of about 45 minutes to 1 hour depending on how fast you read. I'm not gonna mince my words here - that is a joke.
I tried making a visual novel myself once and yes, it was a buttload of work, it really was, and I gave up after like four days but that doesn't change anything about the fact that $7 for a singular hour of a kinetic novel is simply not alright. And I'm not even butthurt that I was one of the clowns who spend their money on this because I genuinely don't give a f about $7. What I'm trying to say here is that not even I, without any kind of technical knowledge or drawing skills, would've had the audacity to sell a ONE HOUR game for freaking $7.
All in all, considering the game's play time to price ratio - yep, it is a scam and should either be free with a link to your Patreon or whatever you use to take in donations so that people who liked it can support you guys out of their own free will or it should be combined with the second paid game and cost like $5 at max. Or make both paid games in this series fully playable in browser so that paying money to download the files would be some kind of 'supporter pack' for people who liked your work.
(PS: Itch.io has some serious problem with it's text formatting and there's nothing I can do about that, sorry.)