I think this is more a human psychological problem of sinking more effort into something familiar but bad, then search for new possibilities rather than a time limit thing.
Dungeons and Dragons has been monetizing the Sunk Cost Fallacy for decades.
From my experience, people that like rules mostly seem to like exploiting them more than just having a framework that emulates a genre.
RPGs especially susceptible to minmaxing, but don't confuse that with "exploiting" the rules. In many ways, it is an exercise in mastering the rules and systems for efficiency and success. Simply being successful at the rules, as written, is not an exploit. It's when you take advantage of gaps in the rules, or use the rules in ways they were obviously not intended, that it becomes an exploit.
I'm pretty much the opposite of a minmaxxer (I'm more of a curious gamer rather than an efficient one), and I admit that in some realms (like miniature games), I consider minmaxxers to be the bane and downfall of great games. But my wife literally owns a t-shirt (of her own creation) that says "happiness is the optimization of systems", so I just have to assume that some people feel very fulfilled by spreadsheet gaming.
Really, what purpose do rules serve?
Part of it is to give a system to optimize and excel at. Part of it is to provide limitations to the player to force roleplaying outside their comfort zone. Part of it is to provide a generator for dramatic situations that culminate in a sufficiently satisfying encounter. Part of it is to create a simulation of a world, so that your actions have reactions. Part of it is simply that RPGs were created by nerds for nerds and boy do nerds love rules. It's a lot of things to a lot of people.
There are RPGs out there with very few rules and ones with a plethora of rules. Groups will generally gravitate towards the game system that most fits their style. D&D seems particularly successful precisely because it gives the nerd-lite version of a roleplaying experience.