1 minute ago, nickhod said:

I'd say that AAA games don't, or at least it's never promoted in the way that MSFS invites have been.

Some smaller developers do, but usually for people with some stronger link to the developer. A DLC developer, forum moderator, long term tester or whatever.

The vast majority seem to do Steam early access type schemes now.

You're getting into kinda broad statements without evidence here.  All three of the closed alphas I've been chosen for, were for what you'd call "triple-A" games.  One for EA, and two for Ubisoft.

Asobo haven't really "promoted" their alpha more than anyone else.  They keep people who specifically signed up to participate in the alpha apprised on the status of alpha invites when there's news to share - pretty normal.  There's just the perception of endless promotion, because people like us at places like this keep talking about it all day, haha.

Paid early access games aren't really proper alphas at all - they are generally used as ongoing fundraisers to keep paying the bills, by smaller devs.  They provide no ability to restrict what hardware configurations are being tested for, and they provide no ability to control things like screenshots and video being all over the internet, because they virtually never have NDAs.

This topic is vinegar and is solely to support someone's displeasure at not being accepted into the Alpha. Ridiculous. Done.