managedVM.autoAddVTPM = "software"

This line is in your .vmx file and I don't think it should be there if you have a VM that's running under Workstation 15. It does nothing for Workstation 15 and should not be there. If this VM was running on Workstation 16.2, it would have enabled an experimental vTPM. But I see no evidence that this experimental feature was enabled for this VM - if it were there would be other lines in your .vmx file - but there aren't.

What I think may be happening is that while that line does nothing in Workstation 15, opening the VM in Workstation 17 will cause it to try to enable the Workstation 16.2 broken vTPM feature. Which is a really, really bad idea.

My advice is to restore the Workstation 15 version of the VM, remove this line from the .vmx file with your favorite text editor, then power up the VM with Workstation 17. If you get the VM powered up and you want a TPM for your Windows 11 VM, modify the VM's settings to reflect that you have a Windows 11 VM, enable encryption (choosing "only files necessary to support a TPM device"), specify a password (don't let Workstation generate one for you), and decided whether you want that password saved by Windows. Then you can add the TPM device. 

The Workstation 16.2 vTPM is a half-baked feature and should be avoided at all costs. It encrypts with a password that can't be recovered. It also had other severe problems (especially if you wanted to clone the VM or move it to another machine.  The deficiencies that this feature had were fixed in Workstation 17 with its virtual TPM and partial encryption implementation.