You are also forgetting that the game is not done, and optimization is one of the LAST things you do, because if you do it early on, you just need to do it all over again. I remember when we were making one of the Call of Duty games, it ran like CRAP up until the last few weeks of development.
If the frame rate is your biggest issue based on an alpha demo, then you're looking at the wrong things.
Agreed.