I just spent the $40 and went through the entire download cycle, and the Exe is showing in the program files but when I click to open nothing happens. Am I missing a step?
Is this the Scrivener-installer.exe that you downloaded or did you run the installer and are now trying to launch the Scrivener.exe? If the former, it may be a bad download; I’d try clearing your browser cache and downloading again from the website, maybe disable any download helpers you have running in case they’re interfering. If the latter, do you get anything at all–a flash as though the program starts but then disappears, or if you open Windows Task Manager is Scrivener listed there at any point in attempting to open it?
There may be some other software on the computer that’s conflicting–Kaspersky was causing a problem with launching Scrivener not long ago, so I’d check first for any security software you have running that may be blocking it. (Scrivener wouldn’t be automatically whitelisted since it’s a rather niche program, so new versions can sometimes trigger security software until a large enough base of their users have installed the software and OK’d it.)
You could try rebooting into Safe Mode and see if launches successfully there; if it does, that would indicate some other software you’re usually running is preventing Scrivener opening, and you can go through your startup items to find the one causing the problem. Depending on the software, you may be able to whitelist Scrivener or exclude it from being monitored, etc., so that the two don’t conflict.