What I don't understand is how L&P hadn't anticipated all of that? If he/she intended the story to be a "slow burn" tale of corruption?, how did he/she expect 2 years worth of writing to do that?
I'm an amateur writer who's story about a nymphomaniac porn actress, started 5 years ago and is currently not even at 1/3 of the story being told. I've only covered about 10 days in my tale. Tbh, given the number of characters that I introduced, I may not get to finish anytime soon, and I don't even have illustrations involved!
I'm fairly certain that, if I tried to turn it into a VN, I would be at the same point as L&P. The thing is when introducing ancillary characters, your story grows exponentially. Again, how could he/she not anticipate how long a "slow burn" would take and having people helping to get it told?
Not trying to defend L&P in this next comment but, if you're hiring people to help you with an illustrated story, doing so Ain't cheap. If you go online to find someone to help with rendering or such, many have an asking price of at least €/$1500 per month; quite expensive. When doing collaborative work, it takes time because their work needs to be approved by the dev before being put into production.
My biggest gripe is, if you have the help, the rendered scenes should be getting better. Changing the character model, which was blamed for a delay, shouldn't have been a necessity. If he/she wants to move the story along, you don't need 15- 16 panels to cover a convo on the couch when 8 or 9 would do or, as someone pointed out, 3-4 panels showing Sophia leaving the room when 2, at the most, would do. I have to call into question L&P's judgment as well as their intent.