I've also only discovered this a few days ago. The problem is that there are two versions of VLC on Google Play. Here are them with the actual amount of users:
[*] VLC for Android beta 0.9 (?) 50,000,000–100,000,000
[*] VLC for Android 1.4.1 5,000,000–10,000,000
So as you can see many users still use the old Beta version. I think the problem is that if you use the old Beta version there was no announcement or update which directed you to download the new app.
E.g. it would be an idea to push an update to the old Beta version which adds a information in the app that you may download the new version. (Or at least push an update with the same built, but this information in the release notes of Google Play)