Anyway, since I promised I’d post one very interesting response I’d gotten on Chess.com, here it is!
Knitro:
"Talekhine has a point. Me and my friends play in chess tournaments, however on our free time we play soulcalibur together and strangely enough, our skills in both areas not only parallel but also complement eachother. It’s odd, but sometimes when I learn new techniques with a character or learn a little bit more about how to play better, the next time I play chess i get slightly better and vice versa. Also, I find that certain characters play like certain openings. For example, when I taught my friends how to play Ivy, I began with “Learning Ivy is like learning the Sicilian defense. She’s a lot of memorization and sharp play, but is rewarding to those who have the ability to learn her.”
I think it has to do with where chess and these games are stored in the brain. From what I’ve heard, chess patterns are stored in the same part of our brain as facial recognition. So learning a new opening is like meeting a new person, and the more you learn about it, the more gets stored in that file of the brain. Similarly, just like how I have memories separated into different places such as who my mom and dad are, who my boss is, who my friend is, etc., there are also special files for what the sicilian defence is, what the french defence is, what combos are for Ivy, what combos are for Amy and so on. Therefore whenever you learn something new, it separates itself into those files.
Chess is also connections made between patterns you’ve seen before. So, as a fighting game player, subconsciously I may make a connection between say, the french defence and Sophitia, as both are play in a classical defensive yet counter-attacking style. Chess players do this all the time, making connections between openings, pawn structures, and endgames. Without making connections with different patterns you’ve seen in the past at the most basic levels, endgames would be impossible. Thats why a tournament play is able to do, say, the rook and king mate very easily and quickly, wheras it would take someone who just knows how the pieces move possibly an hour to do the same.
I think it’s pretty cool that I can improve my chess game by relaxing on the couch wrecking my opponent with Sophitia. Fighting games are also not the only thing that can improve this either. Math is also pattern and process based, so those who are good at or love math (not me haha) also learn similarly and can improve in parallel."
