Near the end of the competition, as he is deep in his analysis, the light craft AI gives up on helping him since it gets overwhelmed. Granted it's not a full Culture Mind (kinda hazy, been a while) but still a point for the meatbag.
I always interpreted the end reveal as showing that control was highly confident of both the outcome of the game and of how Gurgeh got to that outcome.
It's been a while but I am pretty sure that the ship lied when saying that it got overwhelmed and did so only because it was confident he was on the right path but needed to get there in a specific way which wouldn't have worked quite the same if the ship intervened
Yep, basically the nebulous, unknown minds of Control predicted the main character would win, and set up as many conditions as possible to push him to do so. Including bluffing about help from the AI.
It was part of an even bigger game but I'm not going to get into spoilers.
Yeah, he wouldn't have reached such a good solution with help, and that was also originally taken into account by the Culture when they sent him out in the first place, since they knew him that thoroughly.
I think the main character can be so strong at the game by the end because of his immersion in Empire culture. The ships AI would likely be at least as strong with the same experiences. Plus, as you mention, the ships AI is not smartest AI around.
