I feel this point, I'm working on my first game myself and I'm coming here from AVNs like BADIK and TFTUV.
It seems like this game is going along the kinetic novel route, as in, no major plot choices. I think it's a great option for solo and indie devs as it saves on dev resource.
What I'd like to add though, is that you don't necessarily need to have choices that alter and branch the story to give some sense of player agency. Sometimes, just choosing how to respond, resulting in one or a few different lines being displayed, before coming back to the same plot line afterwards, could be enough to give that sense of, "Yes it's me I'm the player, I'm making my own choices!", even though nothing really changed. And you can even do a second playthrough like," alright I was a good, respectful person in the my first playthrough, I'm going to make all the mean dialogue choices and be in a**hole in the second to see how people react. "
I feel like major games that have visual novel elements, like the Persona series, make good use of that, where the choices don't always matter or change anything plot wise, but, still give you an outlet to decide how the MC interacts with the world around them, letting the player resonate with them a bit more and adding some variety and interactivity to the game.
I think the icing on the cake would be, you likely won't even need additional renders depending on what you write, as the characters you speak to can simply respond in a deferent way.