I think the “obsession” was in reference to the many posts about either optimizing strategy, or other games taking inspiration and creating similar but slightly

I think the “obsession” was in reference to the many posts about either optimizing strategy, or other games taking inspiration and creating similar but slightly different variants. As for why, I’d say it’s the simple case of something got popular, and people are copying and analyzing it. It’s a fad, like so many others before it.