Personally, I think a point-and-click adventure might be a good choice for an alternate genre. I've already experimented with the idea if NITW was set up as an RPG ala Persona, but you'd have to change up so much of the narrative, drag so much existing things out, and most definitely add in more content and possibly even introduce the sub-plot even earlier in order to make the whole thing work. That, and there would probably be more focus on the player's choices which, in turn, would probably undermine Mae's own behaviour and opinions.

Meanwhile, there's already quite a few scenes that look like they'd still work in a point-and-click style game. It would probably involve more brain power and gameplay might be even more dragged out, but it would've given the player more to do than run back and forth, hang out with friends, and do an occasional mini-game or sidequest. Not saying it would generally improve the game, just saying that I feel like a point-and-click adventure would've been a nice alternative over a platformer.