Hey there Mango! Thanks so much for taking the time to review the game! A lot of the ideas you mention about interactivity were intended in the original design - having the player control the turret, clicking through the dialogue rather than letting it just play at certain points, etc. Time to implement these things ended up being our main barrier, as well as learning how to program them while many of us were brand new to Unreal Engine or trying to learn how to implement new things. As for the narrative, the original intent of the game design was to couple a narrative experience like a visual novel in an interactive 3D environment. Lots of lessons learned for sure!
I enjoyed trying out your game!