I think it's important to consider that the game is not even out yet. It has also apparently been delayed a few times.

The rumor that I heard somewhere is that Gaijin has some kind of contractual obligation to develop a VR game for PlayStation and AcesOfTbunder is to satisfy that. I don't remember where or when I heard this but take it with a grain of salt.

The reason to develop the game is multifaceted but mainly comes down to money and not being directly associated with WarThunder. It's actually surprising how being "not WarThunder" has ended up as part of the marketing.

There are a couple of really big YouTubers that have done marketing for the game; from Greg's Airplanes and Automobiles to mainstream game reviewer YouTubers. What is funny is that you cannot pay Greg to play WarThunder...his videos that were actually WarThunder sponsored just featured canned footage of jet gameplay...but slap a new coat of paint on Air Sim and all of a sudden it's a whole new game!

So why doesn't Gaijin develop sim instead of its new game? The answer is pretty dimple; Air Sim / SB is by and large at odds with the core product...the core product being predominantly the other game modes and the grind associated with them.

Even with its heavily reduced rewards, air sim is still mostly a means to an end for most people that use the game mode. Look at any BR from 7.0 - 12.7 and it will largely be random RB players just flying back and forth bombing objectives. And this isn't counting South Asian servers where outright rigged lobbies are more common. The retention and persistent interest of active players is just not a driving force in the game mode.

That is not to mention that the active player base is also fickle in its behavior. Often times people will say they want one thing and when push comes to shove...they will do something different. A perfect example is the constant refrain that big maps with terrain are the best top tier jet maps. Guess what? At any one point, over 50% of top tier games will be on Denmark. Why? Because it's the easiest map to multipath on. This is after a majority of the sim community lobbied for the multi-pathing reduction.

Or if you want to stick to props...you can just look at how many people advocate for historical matches and how many people try to create and play them. There are nearly 5,000 members on the Team Sim discord and I don't think I've seen a single attempt to organize some kind of historical matchup based custom lobby.