The rules state the following:

While other game elements may be present, the final piece should be largely identified as a "visual novel".

How far from the traditional sprites-and-text-boxes are we allowed to venture? I want to make something akin to an interactive comic.  Quartett! (=definitely a VN) is fairly similar in it's style of presentation style to what I imagine, but I also want puzzle mechanics; It will probably be a short game.

(Edit: Punctuation mark after quotation mark, not the other way around)

It's a pretty nebulous idea, but as long as the game is largely plot-centric rather than mechanic-centric, it's probably okay. The rule is mostly in place to prevent some of the "jam spam" that's popped up in the past few years of people spamming their games across a ton of unrelated jams.

Sorry for being vague. It's hard to a void when I'm not even sure my self exactly how it's going to work (yet).

There will be a linear story though, so I guess that makes it plot-centric in some definition of the word.