Underpaid, undervalued and frustrated: video game voice actors are demanding change after one raised concerns over pay and explained why she would not be reprising her role in a multimillion dollar franchise.
Now others are speaking out and calling for better and more equitable treatment for actors who earn a tiny fraction of what many of the games make in revenue.
On Saturday, the actor Hellena Taylor – the original voice of the lead character in the multimillion-selling Bayonetta games – posted a series of videos on Twitter, explaining why she was not continuing her role in the series’ third instalment. She said that after being asked to re-audition for the role she played in 2009’s Bayonetta and 2014’s Bayonetta 2, she was offered a $4,000 flat-rate fee for the job. The games have made more than $450m in revenue.
Taylor said she declined. “This is an insult to me, the amount of time that I took to work on my talent, and to everything that I have given to this game and the fans,” she said, asking supporters to boycott the game “in solidarity with people all over the world who do not get paid properly for their talents”. She said she no longer feared the consequences of speaking out. “I can’t even afford to run a car. What are they going to do, take my clothes?”
Taylor’s experience is extreme, but not unique. Speaking to the Guardian, several video game voice actors – high profile award-winners among them – shared their frustrations about their pay and conditions in an industry that has an estimated worth of nearly $200bn. Those working in the UK claim their rates – largely set and controlled by outsourcing companies, whom developers pay to recruit and record voice talent – have not risen meaningfully in 15 years, despite the games industry’s enormous expansion in that time.
“Some people might think that getting paid $4,000 to do a game sounds amazing,” says John Schwab, who plays Dandelion in the Witcher series of games. “But the commitment that it takes to get a game done – we’re talking dozens and dozens of hours of recording. And on top of that, the travel that nobody pays for, the agents’ fees, the tax … People think you show up, work for two hours and a game comes out. Absolutely not.”
Schwab estimated that, after costs, Taylor would have cleared around half the amount she was offered. “I can sympathise with her situation … You get a few thousand pounds to play a lead character, and then that video game makes $700m. How does that make you feel, when you’ve created the role?”
Famous Hollywood actors recruited to provide voice work for games – such as Keanu Reeves, who stars in Cyberpunk 2077 – get paid much more. One agent gave an example of £100,000 for a four-hour recording session.
Side Global, one of the outsourcing companies that provides voice overs for video games, pays on a tiered system that actors described as “insulting” and “discriminatory”. In a guidelines document seen by the Guardian, the company sets out the criteria for different tiers. Tier 1, which pays £250 an hour plus a £500 buyout fee per job, is described as “the superstars of games voiceover”, while noting “some client budgets will not be able to accommodate Tier 1 actors. Because of this, if an actor chooses to be classed as Tier 2 instead, to ensure more chance of being put forward, they may do so.”
Tier 2 actors are paid £50 less an hour, with a £400 buyout and Tier 3 comprises “new signings, drama graduates and actors less known to us”, “older actors who are doing less work on stage and screen”, and those voicing “niche, exotic or complex characters” who may specialise in a “native accent”. These actors are paid £200 an hour, with a £350 buyout. Unlike in TV and film, video game actors are not paid residuals.
Trevor White, who has worked with Side for more than a decade, voicing a range of game characters, said: “There was no rise in pay in years, and then in 2020 we were being incentivised to take a pay cut to work at all,” he said. “The growth in the games industry is exponential, more than film, TV and theatre, and somehow those of us who help supply the voices for those games are getting paid far less. It just doesn’t make sense.”
One long-standing performer said: “In contrast to screen actors, video game actors come into the room with little or no information about the project, before they are expected to give a naturalistic and nuanced performance – in addition to screaming, shouting and grunting – by reading a script off an Excel spreadsheet they’ll have been lucky to have received the evening before.
“Players have started to expect the same experience in games as when they watch a film, and people are winning Bafta awards for their work in games. But the industry still doesn’t see the actor and their work as something to think about until the very end of the process. All game actors want is fair working practices and a fair wage.”
In 2021, in conjunction with Equity UK, the trade union for creative practitioners, some performers tried to get outsourcing companies to sign an agreement promising better terms. Few companies agreed.
Liam Budd, an industrial official for audio and new media at Equity, said: “Royalty payments are the norm in most creative sectors, where the creative contribution of the artist is significant. However, there is a systemic problem in the games industry, with the digital giants and publishers hiring voiceover artists, performers and other creative freelancers at the lowest rate they can get away with.”
Every video game actor who spoke to the Guardian expressed the same frustrations: a lack of transparency and fairness regarding what outsourcing companies are getting paid by developers, compared with what they are paying the actors.
White said: “I can’t tell you how many hours we’ve all put in to try to make realistic progress in terms of transparency and fairness in this business. But we’ve been met with a lot of resistance, obfuscating and avoidance, and I’m sick and tired of it, frankly.”
