Current Events > Game companies haven't bothered negotiating with the voice actors on strike

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http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2017-06-30-the-voice-actor-who-didnt-know-he-was-working-on-fallout-4

In October of last year, an organization called the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists went on strike. This is a labour union made up of something like 160,000 actors and the strike was aimed squarely at the video games industry, or more specifically, 11 companies including the likes of Activision and Electronic Arts. No union actor would take on voice acting or motion capture work with these companies until their demands were met. As of publishing this article, the strike is ongoing.

The union's demands include better transparency - they want their actors to be better informed about the projects they're working on, although even then, I was told they're willing to negotiate.

"We understand the publishers aren't going to give the actual title of the game out to everyone who's auditioning for it, that's fine," said Farley. "The actors that then book the roles should know, but if you want to narrow that down even further, we figure as long as the agent knows the scope of the performance, after signing an NDA, they can better represent us their actors."

There are concerns about vocal stress and stunt safety too. LaMarr, who voiced Ratbag in Shadow of Mordor, also did the character's performance capture too. One scene sees him strung up by a group of Uruks and LaMarr recalls being asked to shoot that scene, which would require the actor himself to be strung up, without any stunt safety professionals. He almost did it too.

These don't sound like unrealistic demands, but so far, the companies targeted by this strike haven't begun to negotiate with the union, so clearly there's an issue there. And this is now starting to have a noticeable impact on the games we'll play - the most high profile example that we know of being Ashly Burch, who voiced Chloe in Life is Strange. She recently turned down the opportunity to return for its prequel, a decision she doesn't appear to have made lightly, and was replaced by a non-union actor.

In a recent interview with that game's developer, Deck Nine Games, Eurogamer was told the following: "It really challenged us, we were well into development when that kind of problem arose. We contemplated lots of different ways to react, including abandoning the project."

They thought about abandoning the project? That sounds extreme, and perhaps a little unbelievable, but it suggests that developers and publishers are starting to feel some amount of pressure here. So why aren't negotiations happening?

Ouch. I guess every game currently in development will be impacted.
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English voice actors aren't very good anyway

A few exceptions, sure, but hearing Nolan North or Troy Baker doing the same voice in every western game gets old.

TheMarthKoopa posted...

English voice actors aren't very good anyway

A few exceptions, sure, but hearing Nolan North or Troy Baker doing the same voice in every western game gets old.

I kind of agree with this.

Also, new talent deserves a shot.
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If this affects Kingdom Hearts or FF7 I'll be devastated.
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Rie Tanaka
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Blue_Inigo posted...

If this affects Kingdom Hearts or FF7 I'll be devastated.

Neither will be out this decade so it won't
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I'm not sure about Baker but I don't think Nolan North is a part of this strike. So this might lead to more roles for him lol.
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It wasn't that long ago when we didn't need gigabytes and gigabytes of voice audio required for every single game ever released. We could actually use that space for stuff like game content.

Blue_Inigo posted...

If this affects Kingdom Hearts or FF7 I'll be devastated.

Prepare to be devastated
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Lol English VA.
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@TheMarthKoopa
Do you know much Japanese VAs make compare to American ones?
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The strike is one of the best things to happen for gaming in years. Everyones sick of hearing the same 5 people voice literally everyone. I'd rather just have subtitles or no voice work at all.

Voice acting for the protag was also one of the things that killed the dialog in fallout 4


Vidya doesn't need to be movies
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Kelystic posted...

Do you know much Japanese VAs make compare to American ones?

I can't really compare to American earnings, I only know that Seiyu earn pitiful amounts even for the really popular actors.

TheMarthKoopa posted...

English voice actors aren't very good anyway

A few exceptions, sure, but hearing Nolan North or Troy Baker doing the same voice in every western game gets old.

The problem is it's way cheaper to pay one guy to voice 15 different characters.
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I'd be okay with them going back to text dialogue instead of voiced, honestly
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Darmik posted...

I'm not sure about Baker but I don't think Nolan North is a part of this strike. So this might lead to more roles for him lol.

Yeah, Nolan North is on the XCOM 2 expansion coming out next month
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The Life is Strange game will have a different voice for Chloe because of this.
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That really sucks. VAs are already getting pretty stagnant.
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From what I understand, video games are some of the worst work for voice actors to do. They do a lot of yelling battle cries all day, which kinda shreds your vocal cords after a while.
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good. why are these VAs getting paid more than developers?
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FightingGames posted...

good. why are these VAs getting paid more than developers?

Because good VAs are hard to find and good developers are extremely easy to find?

Darmik posted...

the most high profile example that we know of being Ashly Burch, who voiced Chloe in Life is Strange

So it will have no impact at all.
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Annihilated posted...

FightingGames posted...

good. why are these VAs getting paid more than developers?

Because good VAs are hard to find and good developers are extremely easy to find?

Capable developers are extremely easy to find. Good developers are like finding a diamond in your Cheerios.
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Here's the problem with working in the video game industry: everyone wants to do it so wages are extremely low.
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synth_real posted...

From what I understand, video games are some of the worst work for voice actors to do. They do a lot of yelling battle cries all day, which kinda shreds your vocal cords after a while.

This is what they should focus on. Not stuff like residuals for sales.
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synth_real posted...

From what I understand, video games are some of the worst work for voice actors to do. They do a lot of yelling battle cries all day, which kinda shreds your vocal cords after a while.

I talked to Steve Blum once about that and he seemed like he vastly preferred anime for that reason. Games are repetitive and stressful and really secretive about what you're even working on. A lot of people don't know what they're in until the game is already done. Like, sometimes they'd be called in as extras for other projects in the same studio. Whenever you hear Yuri Lowenthal, he might have come in to voice another game and they were like "Oh, while he's here anyway let's have him voice a guard in Hitman."

YellowSUV posted...

synth_real posted...

From what I understand, video games are some of the worst work for voice actors to do. They do a lot of yelling battle cries all day, which kinda shreds your vocal cords after a while.

This is what they should focus on. Not stuff like residuals for sales.

Last I read, It was a bonus every 2 million game sales that capped at something like $3300 at 8 million. To me at least it really doesn't seem like that much. I mean, how many games even hit 8 million sales?

But yes, vocal stress and stunt coordinators is something I feel is far more important and would probably get more of the public on their side if they focused on that. That's something that affects beginner voice actors a lot more too. Big names like Baker and Blum can be like "I'm about to lose my voice. Let's take a two hour break and continue after that." Small actors would just get replaced if they tried to make a demand like that and the new guy wouldn't be any better off.
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GAMER_X posted...

The strike is one of the best things to happen for gaming in years. Everyones sick of hearing the same 5 people voice literally everyone. I'd rather just have subtitles or no voice work at all.

The funny thing is, that's still going to happen, only it's going to be a different set of 5 people that can't act worth a shit and get paid with free coffee, assuming of course developers just don't abandon voice acting entirely going forward.

While I wouldn't mind some more VA variety myself, this situation with the strike is only going to make things worse, not better. And while voice acting isn't crucial to games, if English VAs cease to be a thing, I at least want the option to turn off any other kind of VA as well instead of being stuck listening to some subtitled noise.
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YellowSUV posted...

synth_real posted...

From what I understand, video games are some of the worst work for voice actors to do. They do a lot of yelling battle cries all day, which kinda shreds your vocal cords after a while.

This is what they should focus on. Not stuff like residuals for sales.

To my knowledge, isn't that part of it too?

Along with wanting more information on the role, as many are left entirely blind. many don't even know the game they are working on supposedly.
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This is totally fair, I have a feeling that their money demands would be almost entirely dropped when the safety and screaming all day fixing demands are met.

That's like the thing you bring to the negotiation with the intent to drop it for the other stuff.

The safety one makes total sense, so does the not having to yell for 8 hours thing.
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I'm sure there are voice actors in India who will do the job for cheaper.
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Funkydog posted...

YellowSUV posted...

synth_real posted...

From what I understand, video games are some of the worst work for voice actors to do. They do a lot of yelling battle cries all day, which kinda shreds your vocal cords after a while.

This is what they should focus on. Not stuff like residuals for sales.

To my knowledge, isn't that part of it too?

Along with wanting more information on the role, as many are left entirely blind. many don't even know the game they are working on supposedly.

Vocal stress and safety has always been one of the things they were striking for but that just gets overshadowed in all the coverage regarding it. Interviews typically start with "So it looks like you want more money for your work" and then they get defensive and only end up talking about the bonuses.

A lot of voice actors have come out and said they aren't even told if they're working on a sequel to a game they've been in. It affects their bargaining power because companies typically want to bring back people to reprise their roles. Game information has leaked before from voice actors, so companies are really wary about disclosing too much information. However, you could argue that their contracts already have an NDA clause so going further and keeping that tight a lid on things is too restrictive.

joe40001 posted...

This is totally fair, I have a feeling that their money demands would be almost entirely dropped when the safety and screaming all day fixing demands are met.

That's like the thing you bring to the negotiation with the intent to drop it for the other stuff.

The safety one makes total sense, so does the not having to yell for 8 hours thing.

Well, yeah, Negotiation 101 is asking for more so you have things to give up. A lot of people don't seem to understand that for a lot of things on both sides, though.

The pay for games is comparatively not very good, though. If you want to make money, voice actors will probably tell you to go into audio books or commercials.
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These don't seem like unreasonable demands to me.
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