And... your conclusion is those guys would come back if there were an RPS?
Wiley.
They would come back or new would come.
Lets say 500 players were here before..... 100 of them were RPS crowd........ 100 didn't get hooked or got bored.... 300 for other reasons.
So that's 200 people
The game currently caters to 1 type of players, I do not like this wording but it describes what is currently as 'air quake arena'
Look, how it would look with the proposed system:
It's 1939, 1 type of player who doesn't care about achievements or what plane to fly, takes a spit I and flies, 2nd type of player who wants his favourite plane, also takes a early war plane to get enough points for his 'favourite plane'.
3rd type of player who wants the sense of achievement does the same, not because he wants a specific plane, he wants to feel 'moving up the ladder'.
So that's 3 type of players serviced compared to 1.
Everyone in the meantime is using early and mid war planes...... changing the balance of late planes which are currently used in 90% to about 20-30% overall. Once the years move forward the ratio naturaly changes, because as the years move forward, the 1st type of player flies the planes of the current year, 2nd type of player has his favourite plane unlocked by default and 3rd type of player still goes for the most advanced plane.
So it's not 'only' RPS, it's the next generation of RPS lol.
Add to that a realistic map and axis vs allies and the 4th type of crowd comes back - those that want the game to be more realistic.