Quote Originally Posted by Max_Killjoy View Post
That's very close to how I'd describe it... and I'd include a tie-in to verisimilitude. That is, player agency is both in part and part of the "fictional reality" (the settings, the NPCs, etc) reacting to the PCs' actions as if it and they were real.


And more controversially, my personal definition goes on to assert that the PC is the player's "interface point" with the fictional reality, the one part of that fictional reality that the player controls. This makes the player the "soul" of the player character, and it makes the PC's inner feelings, desires, thoughts, and choices sacrosanct and inviolate, with other players (GM or otherwise) only able to intrude with the individual player's explicit permission to do so. Don't mind control or mechanically social control or otherwise hijack the PC of a player who does not enjoy that aspect of the gaming endeavor.

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My outlook is in-line with your interface-point idea. Just about any information that a player should know should be accessible through their character sheet in some way. This extends beyond mechanics and to the world itself - character backgrounds, goals, alignment, etc. is all an attempt to help bring the player into line with the world around it.