And to jump beyond survival to hard core means there’s finality. Introducing the ultimate consequence for your decisions. This induces low time preference. I go to bed early when there’s no respawn and I’m still punching trees. Mistakes will be made and small threats combine to my doom... every damn time.

It absolutely does. This combination also forces prudence, or skill, or some combination of the two from the player. There is no meaningful in game progression possible in creative mode.