Video Game Voice Actors ON STRIKE

Looking at the info document on why they're on strike (https://www.sagaftra.org/files/interactive_strike.pdf), way too much of this seems like a no brainer... The contingent compensation element could probably be argued over until the end of time (i.e., the fact the programmers don't get compensation is a fair point, but who has to be the "bad guy" here?)... But some of this is absurd.

"For example, once, without a stunt coordinator on set, a video game developer tried to do a wire pull — which means he basically made himself jerk really hard and fast across a room — without someone on set to monitor his safety."

Excuse me? The question "Do we actually have the proper folks on-site to do this stunt safely so that no one gets hurt?" Should not be a question anyone has to ask. Period. The answer should just be "Yes. Of course. Because no one should get hurt because of this." Otherwise you end up like the idiots on the the Back to the Future II set... ("The Hoverboard Scene In Back To The Future 2 Nearly Killed A Stuntwoman")

"We have also heard stories of actors coming into a session and being asked, without prior consent, to do content such as simulated sex scenes and racial slurs."

Congratulations video game industry, you are behaving on the same level of sketchiness as your average Craigslist "modeling" job posting...

The compensation thing aside, there are some very valid points here. Hiring proper stunt coordinators and not giving the actors some basic info about the role before they take it on are pretty basic. Those kinds of things should be done regardless. The compensation thing reads like the actors should get the same bonuses the company get for how a game performs, but that money doesn't always go straight to all the people that worked on the game. Non game software developers already put in a lot of hours beyond what they're paid, so I can't even imagine how bad they have it. Ultimately it sounds like their could be some good compromise here that the parties aren't coming to. 

I think kingdom hearts 3 will be afftect.

I think the bonus based on game sales isn't totally reasonable. Unless the person being a VA was a major part of advertising you really can't say one person made a major impact. Case in point, there was that guy from GTA4 I beleave it was. That being said, if the contract they've been using until now was written in 1994 back when the industry was very differnt, then it should seriously be updated and heavily reviewed.

You've got to love how industry leaders pit voice actors against developers, meanwhile they don't have to up the compensation of anybody, the working conditions remain the same, and they can keep shafting all those people over while laughing their asses off from atop their pile o' money.

Its almost impossible to get a job VA'ing if you denied joining the union, they straight block indie va's from taking jobs with these kinds of companies so during the strike we might hear more voices start to slip onto the scene now that they wont get hard blocked by the union

Workplace safety is not part of contract negotiations, its under OSHA and you have OSHA beat safety into the workplace with a LawHammer.

Workplace safety is the law.

If your job is violating saftey you call OSHA for free, not a union that bills you each paycheck.

Unions are great- Nolan North is paying a union to fight for something he disagrees with.  His union dues are forcing him to miss work.  Barbara D is not missing work over this, and is not having her paychecks skimmed by the union, and is not hating on Burnie for taking her to zipline without a union Stunt Safety Coordinator on hand.

Should we hate on Burnie for filming Barbara on a zipline, 

or teaching Mica to ride a bike, or some of those crayzy things AH crew do,

without paying a union stooge to watch over it?

Unions say YES.

I dont care what some moneygrabbing union says, I am not gonna hate on Burnie for it.

This is largely being framed as a story about the money but there are so many more things that really do need to be fixed to deal with the safety and working condition aspects of the job.

I have no problem with developers not paying or docking pay from voice actors who turn up late or don't turn up... if you have a full-time job you'll get the same why shouldn't that apply to contract workers too??

Equally I have no problem with voice actors not having to do gruelling grunts and the like for hours on end and not getting paid a better rate for it as well as dealing with long vocal sessions and the like - I've done this work for voice recognition research as well as a few jobs in oration and it is really hard going - doing it for seven hours days as a lot of people in full-time jobs do is inhuman (as in to do it you'd have to have inhuman vocal chords and throat, but equally making people do it is inhuman).

As for compensation when the game is very successful, how about they get a percentage of the turnover divided by the number of hours they put in compared to everyone else involved in the project? Oh, that would be too small??? Well shit, you're completely out of luck then because the game doesn't revolve around VAs, it revolves around the engine programmers, graphic artists and QA testing team primarily and then a huge number of other people, even the sound effect people have more impact on most games than the VAs, sorry but that a fact of the system... if you don't enjoy it do a different job (e.g. VAing animated films or the like). I might also point out that the devs not giving programmers residuals is entirely in line with the _ENTIRE_ programming industry... anyone involved in programming MS Word ever get residuals? Even if they got a miniscule amount they would still be millionaires by this point... in other words it is not an industry in which it even makes sense.

The problem here is that films are based around their actors and VAs. The computer industry is based on the programmers of the engines and programme stacks that are the core of the computer programme (game or not). If anyone deserves residuals then it is definitely not going to be the (still largely if you include all the Indie games) optional extras of VAs and even actors used in the occasional FMV titles.

Then again this is a clash of culture thing and so there is probably going to run and run until the non-union VAs push the union ones out of the industry... for the most part. Just look at Japan, there are huge numbers of VAs who are celebrities in their own right there and it is on that basis that they may contribute to a game but until that really is the case (and it is only so in some specific genres in Japan) then its not going to get them more pay anywhere else either.