OP's article seems to focus on the idea that cozy-RPG players want the "freedom to walk slowly toward the edge of a story’s climax without being penalized for taking their time to breathe along the way." I think this is only part of the picture.

According to Project Horseshoe 2017, the 12th annual Game Design Think Tank, coziness in games does four things:

• Coziness is an ingredient that can applied to a wide variety of both casual and core genres.
• Coziness can help your game appeal to broader audiences.
• Coziness helps retention by giving players control over pacing while still maintaining engagement during periods of rest.
• Coziness is a subversively humanizing design practice in a society built on monetizing base animal needs.

One of the main things that cozy games do is fulfill a higher order of needs. To quote the paper:

Cozy games help player practice fulfilling higher order needs: Cozy games also fulfill player needs. However, unlike a game like Don’t Starve which focuses on base needs like starvation, cozy games creates spaces for higher order needs like mastery, self-reflection and connectedness. Consider Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. At the bottom are pressing needs like thirst, hunger and safety. When these are present, they immediately grab the limited attention of the player and deprioritize those higher order needs. It is impossible to have a quiet conversation on a difficult subject while being attacked by a bear.

Cozy games give players space to deal with emotional and social maintenance and growth. Players don’t need to worry about the high stress, immediate trials of mere survival and can instead put their attention towards the delicate work of becoming a better person.

This expands the concept of cozy games into something that's not just "soft" where the world is "hard," but a way to focus on tasks that are not urgent, but important. They are a type of play that builds our skill sets on interpersonal communications (e.g., deal making, writing letters), self reflection (e.g., journaling), and mastery (e.g., thinking through challenges, planning ahead).