Your introspection resonates with me hard. Burning out on past projects, and the question of if you can even still be passionate about a personal story when you're not the person that wrote that story anymore are things I've also encountered in my time making stuff. I appreciate you leaving up the original version, and you being so candid about the future of the project.
I've made my peace with the dissociation and disconnect from my work. I'm glad I've made the art I've made in the past, but know that my life has changed so drastically, I couldn't recreate the artifacts or development circumstances of their making anymore. Even for LONER_DOG, which released just earlier this month for the toxic yuri vn jam, I went through so many emotions, that I now have changed so much I cannot believe I was capable of writing it just a few weeks ago lmao
Furthermore, as a practiced gamedev & artist, I totally agree with the move to not touch the story again directly if you don't believe you could do it justice. I have a good handful of projects that have a "spiritual successor" energy to them, where I pick up past topics but revisit them with an angle I feel more confident in in the present day.
Understanding what makes WL chapter 1 appealing and then putting that core into something you fuck with more atm might be a path forward? idk it's your project hehe
Regarding the entire itch situation, a migration to the margins, of self-hosted websites, is a necessary parallel vein all of us need to draw from now I believe.
Thanks for the post mortem :3