Jooji

I'm a college student studying computer science who got into anime and visual novels about a year ago. ever since then, It's been my dream to create a visual novel of my own!
I'm a sucker for sci-fi so of course, that would mean my favorite VN would Steins;Gate
Happy to be here!
 

Thank you for the feedback! 
 
As far as the AI puppets, you hit the nail right on the head with my intention for them. like you said, essentially, they have different ideas about their mission. Although, my intention would be to only have like one or two of them blending in, rather than this whole university being filled with them.
As for using HS grads going to a university, Ill do some thinking and try to come up with a clever reason why they would be chosen. And if I cant, I will definitely rethink the setting and characters of the story. Perhaps rather than being set in a traditional university, I could set the story in grad school so that these characters will have already had their college education. Also, maybe their initial reason for grouping together could be some sort of group project that the grad school uses rather than a traditional thesis paper? Just some thoughts I had while typing this.
As far as the prologue stories, if I can do like you said and make these backstories really significant so that they enhance the main story, I would definitely be up for the challenge.
I will definitely dedicate some time to getting into this AI's head to see who it is as a character, and what it really wants.
Anyways, i'd just like to thank you again for giving me feedback!  
 
 
 
 

Maybe I've seen too many android/AI stories recently but one thing that is pretty unclear for me from your description is what the stakes are in the story? I think one of the main reasons I don't find the concept interesting at this point is that you say next to nothing about the AI running the show and that's central to the whole intrigue. Giving it interesting patterns of behaviour and motivations will be crucial, so without seeing any of that I can't say whether you're making a Blade Runner or a Beatless.
Also, the fake university full of puppet androids sounds like a massive overkill as a plot device and something that in no reality could remain hidden, unless you set it in some kind of post-apocalyptic, fractured world. Also, why use HS grads to create your ultimate AI? And someone lured in by sports scholarship? Wouldn't you want, like, accomplished (young) scientists and set the whole thing in a research laboratory? That would also make the puppet idea a lot more manageable – maybe have like one or two android helpers to the main AI with different ideas about their mission and the humans helping the process. A great source of conflict and confusion for the protagonists, who might misinterpret where the actual threat is coming from.
I kind of like the prologue stories idea, but @Dreamysyu is right that it sets the project for a pretty massive scale. Also, it only makes sense if you want these backstories to play heavily into the main plot, otherwise a few conversations about the character's motivation to come to the place and their backgrounds will do the same. Also, revealing how they were lured in over time might add to the mystery, with characters exchanging that information with each other and starting to feel something is off.
That's just what came to my mind after reading your summary, I hope it'll be helpful.

I'm a college student studying computer science who got into anime and visual novels about a year ago. ever since then, It's been my dream to create a visual novel of my own!
I'm a sucker for sci-fi so of course, that would mean my favorite VN would Steins;Gate
Happy to be here!
 

Upon doing some rethinking, I feel like I will probably do away with the 5 initial stories and just focus on the main story. As far as a demo goes, I think I will write it in a similar way I had intended these five stories to be written, except from the perspective of the MC instead. Then the main story fill continue from the demo. I feel like this should remedy the whole genre shift issue while allowing me to keep the current story I have in mind.
 

I may be wrong, but, to be honest, this project seems way too ambitious for a starter project. Are you sure you do not want to start with some smaller and more easy to make project, simply to see how things work and to build some experience?
As for your ideas. I have some trouble understanding how it will look in a complete project, but, overall, it depends on how exactly you are going to implement all of your ideas rather than what these ideas are. So far from I get the impression from your explanation that the first half of your game is going to be mostly raising sim-like, with little text and a lot of choices and interaction, and with the story introduced more in adventure game-style (through environment and dialogue), while the second part of your story is going to be more VN-like, with a lot less choices and a lot more narration, and entirely story-focused. That's not a very good structure, in my opinion, because such genre shift would alienate a lot of players. It would be a lot better if the second part also used some modification of the UI from the first part, and/or, rather than just introducing the characters, if the first part also included some long story segments, probably connected to the characters' backstories and why they were chosen to attend that university (or something like that).
Anyway, I hope my criticism doesn't discourage you. Good luck!