1. A participant in a
game, either real or
virtual, like
baseball or
Half-Life.
Recent movies such as
The Matrix,
eXistenZ and
The Thirteenth Floor hint at the possibility that we may be unwitting players in a
game that we hadn't previously
imagined.
2. A person with an
ability to get other people to do things that they hadn't initially intended, often without any realization of their
being used, as in
The Player.