Thank you so much for the kind words, I'm really glad you enjoyed it so far! :3
Using those sprites bothers me too haha, it's great that stuff like that exists for people like me who can't draw; but at the same time it's frustrating because I know how I want everything to look in my head, but I can't create it T_T
The sprites with expressions are still creative commons assets but they do look better than the ones without expressions. I actually commissioned someone to create custom art for Kuro, but I've not heard from her in a few weeks so maybe she's too busy to do it now or something.
As for Kuro, yeah the poor guy is kinda messed up but he really does love the MC bless him and by the time the game's finished it'll be explained how come he's the way he is :3 Going downstairs that you mentioned is probably my favourite scene so far actually! A lot of the story gets kinda boring for me when I'm reading it over and over again whilst testing stuff; but that scene still gives me chills xD
It's good to know that the game has unique points, because while I've played a lot of otome myself, I probably haven't gotten through as much as other people and I personally got bored of a lot of otome games because the romance was always the same (especially with the mobile app ones!) I prefer the ones where the plot comes first and the romance second. I was kinda worried that maybe people might think that it was wrong to do it that way, or wrong to only have the one romantic interest or something. At the end of the day I just wanted to make it the way I would like to play an otome haha, with lots of bad endings and focus on a yandere guy :3
Tim who voices Kuro does such a great job with the character, I really hope he will be alright to stick with the project because I can't imagine anyone else playing Kuro now!
The demo with all the swapped art is done but I'm still waiting on all the voice acting for those 2 routes to be done before I release it and since most of the voice actors have volunteered, I don't want to rush anyone because that'd be mean, haha. Also the next route (Princess) is just over half written, it's slow going because of how little time I get to work on it, but it's coming along :3
Thanks again for saying so many nice things about the demo, I really appreciate you taking the time to do that and it also gives me more drive to keep making it if other people are enjoying it too, instead of just me! xD