The dev is already struggling with the story of one LI imagine adding a couple more.
Exactly, i get it that many people want a building relationship with Ashley, Samantha or others... but imagine this, and whats going on storywise so far... this would be way to much to handle, really... and the DEV is already burned out, how in the world should he handle different love-branches too? Its a wise decision to minimalize the branches if you want to tell a good story... but maybe it would be wise too to not introduce other girls if you dont plan on building up something with them... Shiho is nice and all, but nobody would have missed her if she never made it in the game.
Samantha is already out of a possible relationship, what is a good choice... of course it will get more and more juicy with her, but it wont lead to something serious, thats very clear, and she made it very clear.
On the Ashley route there are some hints shown that she might be really interested in the MC (besides the sex) but i think her Story-arch will kill every relationship possibilites in the long run.
So if you played the game and paid good attention, its clear that the only real LI will be emily... Iam okay with that. Keep it simple if you dont want things to grow way over your head.
But the DEV already hinted some Story things that will be huge, we are already at epsiode 8 and nothing really gets going. It still feels like day 1-2. Relationships are not really going, Storywise nothing really happened so far... but there is so much already hinted that must be resolved, Emilys friend, Ashleys Family (which will be a big part i guess, this one cant be handled in 2-3 episodes) Samantha has something going on... And overall, they are in a social-rehab system, this wasnt a point until now really. All together this will need at least another 8-10 episodes... to branch everything into multiple relationships will be just to much.
But i think it doesnt matter anyways, its already clear that the DEV cant handle this stuff, he burned out, cant deliver the episodes as he wants, and did no progress on developing since May or June. It would be a huge surprise if we get another good episode this year. And an even bigger surprise if this game will be complete in a good way. Other games shared this fate already, sometimes they get finishes in a rush, which turned out to be worse than to be abondoned. (i hate i if a game gets the complete tag and is miles away of being complete cause it just rushed to the finish with no good conclusion)
Its really sad cause Halfway house is awesome and got some of the best characters around here.