So I'm surprised there was never a topic on this, from what I've seen, so I thought I might as well make a post covering some of the most basic stuff about DISTRUST.
Also, just a warning that there is some minor gore in this post as Danganronpa was originally meant to be a lot more graphic than it turned out to be.
http://i.imgur.com/TjTDPPK.jpg
It's probably best to just start this topic off by talking about the name. Danganronpa was originally under the working title 'DISTRUST'. In the picture above you can see some early promotional material for DISTRUST. Like the box above, most of the promotional material has the phrases '15 Students' and '7 Days' plastered all over them. This leads me to believe that there would be a 7 day time limit in the original game, rather than a more indefinite one presented. It can also be noted that there are a lot of Trust vs. Distrust motifs in the promotional material, which means that the game was probably more focused on that rather than Hope Vs. Despair like the Danganronpa we all know today does.
Next lets take a look at the characters...
http://i.imgur.com/fXq1Th6.jpg
From left to right
(Top) Byakuya Togami, Sakura Oogami, Leon Kuwata, Aoi Asahina, Hifumi Yamada, Kyouko Kirigiri, Chihiro Fujisaki
(Bottom) Makoto Naegi, Touko Fukawa, Yasuhiro Hagakure, Celestia Ludenburg, Mondo Oowada, Sayaka Maizono, Kiyotaka Ishimaru, Junko Enoshima
These are all VERY early beta designs. And before you ask, no I did not mislabel Fukawa, that was legitimately her original design. The only two I'm not entirely unsure of are Maizono and Kirigiri, those two might be flipped, as the only 2 I had troubles putting names to faces were those two, since those two are much different than any previous beta artwork I've seen before. Needles to say, lot of them had several revisions that closer to the characters you would recognize.
For some more clearer beta designs, here are all of the characters compared to a few of their beta designs.
http://24.media.tumblr.com/d29271d5292f391948521caa77af2fe0/tumblr_mr53b1ATbr1sp8isko1_1280.jpg
http://25.media.tumblr.com/52b4a9c48c9e389646a9e4819fcc1e27/tumblr_mr53b1ATbr1sp8isko2_1280.jpg
http://25.media.tumblr.com/285ce32b2aa7bb20801a8d3c3add9ebf/tumblr_mr53b1ATbr1sp8isko3_1280.jpg
http://25.media.tumblr.com/3be884acbede7e407e01e27ba99119c2/tumblr_mr53b1ATbr1sp8isko4_1280.jpg
http://25.media.tumblr.com/06c097f5303f907d2b528b6162b24e33/tumblr_mr53b1ATbr1sp8isko5_1280.jpg
http://25.media.tumblr.com/d5e34c7614abdb4a4fb00aa0a729d162/tumblr_mr53b1ATbr1sp8isko6_1280.jpg
http://24.media.tumblr.com/d1a49ab5cb5da8ce08432e7ff09f8a97/tumblr_mr53b1ATbr1sp8isko7_1280.jpg
http://24.media.tumblr.com/8e6f61c1fdde5617b7f91cdb7645506f/tumblr_mr53b1ATbr1sp8isko8_1280.jpg
https://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_maarbggf7I1rq76f4o2_500.gif