In the new method couldn't you map the players into an AofH with something like the following.

_players => [ map { { Player => $_ } } @$arg{players} ],
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Then you could access it below with

$self->{_players}[0]->{Player}->out();  # this works
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Then you would be storing the object reference in the Player key and would be able to use that same hash to store other state data however you felt neccessary.

$self->{_players}[0]->{Score} = 100;
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