Voice actor Jennifer Hale wants little introduction, having gained fame enjoying characters like Metroid Prime’s Samus Aran, Bastila Shan from Knights of the Outdated Republic, and naturally Mass Impact’s one true Commander Shepard. She’s additionally recognized for Konami’s Steel Gear Strong collection, wherein she’s performed the shifty geneticist Naomi Hunter because the collection’ inception in 1998. However in a latest podcast look, Hale revealed that her first MGS gig voicing that necessary character paid solely $1,200.
Beforehand, Hale averted naming Steel Gear Strong immediately in interviews, solely saying in September {that a} “sport made $176 million” and paid her an hourly wage that was “approach lower than [what] I wished it to be.” However in this week’s episode of the My Good Console podcast, presently out there in early entry, Hale responded shortly to host and critic Simon Parkin’s query as to what that $176 million sport was: It was Steel Gear Strong.
She agreed with Parkin that her unique MGS pay, $1,200, is at a “grotesque disparity” with $176 million, saying “it’s indicative of what’s taking place in fashionable tradition. […] For each greenback that the workaday particular person makes—and [voice actors] are workaday folks; all actors, on-camera, voice-over, who will not be celebrities are workaday folks—we make a greenback for each $399 [executives] make.”
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Nonetheless, “I like [Metal Gear],” Hale stated. “It was such a loopy departure from something I’d finished earlier than. I beloved it as a result of it was good, and since it was simply so distinctive. […] And it’s darkish, and it’s mysterious, and it’s intense, and […] I beloved every thing about it.”
At present, Hale is certainly one of many online game voice actors ready to strike over what they inform Kotaku is “an existential struggle to be sure that they cling on to the rights to their very own voices, their very own pictures, as a result of that’s what they make their residing with, in addition to obtain wages that may sustain with inflation in order that they will proceed to be professionals on this house economically.”
Throughout her podcast look, Hale strengthened this final level and stated she desires voice actors to obtain residuals for sport work “on a versatile construction that honors the indie builders, that honors the budgets and capacities of groups. I want to see that.”
SAG-AFTRA members licensed a online game strike with a 98 % “sure” vote on September 25.