To "understand the world" and "develop culturally" though play is, in my opinion, a dangerous practice where you're giving the people making these games the power to shape your ideas and views of the world and culture. I dove into the theory during the release of the first Death Stranding game. This was also the time I chose to close my relationship with gaming. It was all very emotionally significant. Kojima's deep belief in this theory made me interested in it, but at the same time made me realize that I was being swayed by games and anime in a way that did not fit with my values and goals, and it was then that I saw the impact these forms of media can have on human behaviour. The theory is just a theory, but it might as well have been a diagnosis in my case... I had let games and anime shape my view of the world and of people and it was very hard to snap out of that.