itch.io

Please understand that this is someone's livelihood. Any job deserves payment, especially work that people have clearly put lots of time and effort into (such as this.) It's like asking a chef if you have to pay for the steak you ordered.
Gaming is a luxury, not an essential part of life. If this game is paid it will not have any real impact on you, but it will on the creator. It is their choice if the game is paid or not.

if you only work on one project at a time you can get serious burnout and the project will stop being fun. that's how most creators end up abandoning their games ENTIRELY. it also demotivates creators when they get criticism that isn't constructive (like this.) if you want more updates then instead of making the dev feel bad about prioritizing other works, compliment what they've made so far and show interest in future content. enthusiasm is the best motivation. /nm