by Enrique Caroli on Nov 13, 2008
Not a major problem
There's a lot of speculation going on in the video game industry right now about it's connections to the various unions for voice actors. The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA) recently extended it's current contract with the industry for next year, allowing for modest starting pay increases. This basic contract has been in effect since AFTRA initially negotiated with the video game industry over 20 years ago.
The extension is effective January 1, 2009 through December 31, 2009, and will introduce a 3 percent increase in initial compensation for all session fees, as well as a .5 percent bump in AFTRA H&R contributions.
On the other hand, the more militant Screen Actor's Guild (SAG) is starting to make rumbles about a strike. It's not the first time either - they nearly did it three years ago. Luckily, only about 10-15% of the industry uses voice actor's from SAG; the majority comes from AFTRA or aren't union at all.
One of the big problems for the unions when it comes to videogames is that they only cover a small portion of all the voiceover work done in the business, about 10-15% according to Dave. On the other hand, they cover some of the biggest franchises, like "Madden NFL" and "Halo." And a lot of videogame publishers still like getting movie and TV stars to do voices, particularly for licenses. If you want an actor with TV and/or movie credits working on your videogame, you probably need to do it under a SAG or AFTRA contract.
One thing I don't see any of the traditional news media understanding about this issue is how ineffective a short strike is going to be in this industry. And when I say short, I mean that a strike lasting 6 months or more (usually considered long) could possibly have no effect on the industry as a whole. With such long development times and the plethora of non-union imitation artists available, the industry could very easily outlast the unions if it came to a strike. I'm sure it has the unions scratching their heads a little.
For more information about the AFTRA contract for 2009, please check here.
For more information about the speculated SAG strike, please check here.