It is a while since I have done ab-initio instruction, but the point was made during my instructor training that the aim was to show the symptoms of the incipient stage of VR, and then the recovery. It seems to me that there is a real purpose and value in going this far for the student - if for no ther reason than to make himm/her aware.
I remember several occasions when instructors I knew were flying together vying with each other to get a higher and higher rate of descent in VR before recovery - it was never a game that I joined in on. My experience of even the incipient stage was that it was so unpredictable that I really did not want to go further. I am not at all sure that we know enough about VR to play with it in this way - certainly an area for the test pilot in my book, and a high starting altitude to the exercise!