I'll add my amen here as well. I love the products. So with love I say that there is sometimes too much adherence to "tradition" or "the original didn't have" .
This is evident here, and in another of my great pet peeves, the lack of a tuning knob on the Wurlitzer (don't yet know if it was added in Wirli V2, I sure hope so).
THe Wurli engine totally supports it, as evidenced by the fact that the PITCH BEND WHEEL (which the original sure didn't have) works. I also found that in my DAW it exposes the tuning parameter and it works exactly as I would wish, but I still can't tune the standalone version ONLY because there is no control for it in the UI.
It seems that some classic designs/features can be changed or added to to take advantage of virtual technology, and others are not.
So I am in favor of a checkable parameter on all VSTs that do not have a classical implementation of sustain. When checked this means that:
Organs behave as though you are holding any key that is played. Percussive stops are not affected.
Synths ideally would get two choices:
Hold Note (which amounts to the same as above, and means do not start the release portion of envelopes until sustain is released)
or
Sustain Release, which would need a second release control in the UI that would be used when the pedal is down and the note is released. Releasing the pedal would switch to the normal Release value. (It would probably make sense to have the Sustain Release value simply add to the Release value, as there is little reason to allow a shorter sustain release, but then maybe not, I can imagine it might be interesting when stacking multiple instruments to have a synth sound that was shorter when the piano was sustaining, and then a longer release when not...
)
<EDIT- The following was ill considered on my part, in respect to the original poster's observation that this is especially an issue in Analog Lab, where not everyone can edit the modulation routings:
// Matrix 12 might be an exception to this, I THINK that you can do anything you set your mind to by programming the pedal to the right modulation destination(s)... the example in the article referenced above gets you piano like sustain but you can get infinite hold by using other methods.// >