Freddie saw it differently. "I grew up because of it." he replied simply. "It changed things for the beter, and then it all just sort of took off. Maybe it is charisma, talent. Both. But it started out with that one little cheapass board and a how-to book." He probably came off as arrogant. According to Florence he did so in every press interview he ever gave but he was a self taught prodigy that had been referred to as the man who revitalised chess single handed. You didn't just get called something like that and do the stupid self depricating thing most people did when complimented.
Compliments didn't come around often enough for that.
As for impacting how he thought, he didn't know about all that. "I think it obviously had an impact because my life changed, because I got out of Jersey, because I travelled the world. Because I discovered there was something I could do better than anyone else. I don't know who I would have become but I'm pretty sure he'd have been a nobody. Unremarkable life, unremarkable story. No one can ever take my titles from me though even if they don't exist outside of a musical here. I won those, I earned them and my name stays next to those years forever. Without Chess, yeah I'd be a different man."
So he thought anyway. It was a logical conclusion to come to. "Thing is though I don't know how you can teach that to a machine. How much of what I do is my life experiance. My own choices. I don't always make the obvious play, I sometimes let them get a game off me just to hype up the press but I always know I'll pull it back. You can't teach a machine showmanship. You can't teach it how to figure out an opponents tells, what'll throw them completely off their game. I'm willing to try here but I guess I just find it all a little Star Trek"