I had something similar, and yeah you can replace the entire OS with a customized version, which took someone significant effort to strip away the GA (Google Apps probably?) from it. So the answer depends on how much effort you want to put into the task - it’s doable, but not easy.
Neither can the Chrome or Youtube apps, among others…
Ok then apparently his play store must have gotten hidden somehow. My theory is that he just fucked up.
I had something similar, and yeah you can replace the entire OS with a customized version, which took someone significant effort to strip away the GA (Google Apps probably?) from it. So the answer depends on how much effort you want to put into the task - it’s doable, but not easy.