Well, you know, for all intents and purposes, it IS an album.
It has 8 full songs! That's too much to even be qualified a mini album according to the rules of ... say ... most countries (including Japan!). Just because they CALL it a single doesn't make it a single : P
If I released something with 2 songs on it with a total length of 8 minutes and called it an album, would that
make it an album? Of course not, it'd be a single.
So I think we should just see this as an album, because that's basically what it is