It’s an over simplification to say the Cubase is “Dorico play mode on steroids” but it’s a reasonable starting point for understanding what it is for. You can also combine live audio recordings with MIDI data and virtual instruments.
The basic idea of a DAW is that you manipulate the MIDI data directly, without any reference to music notation.
Of course Cubase does have a “score editor”, but it wouldn’t make sense to try to work in Cubase using the only the score editor, just as it wouldn’t make sense to try to create a score in Dorico by only using Play mode to add notes to piano rolls.