How should face models be compensated in video games?
What, precisely, is the value of an actor's face in the world of video games?
Say you're a performer who lands a gig on a video game. They only need a single day's work from you, and they're up front about what it is: they need to scan your exceptionally distinctive face to make a highly detailed 3D model of a video game character. You sign the paperwork, go in, get scanned, and then 2-3 years later you see your own face staring back at you in a trailer announcing a new playable character.
That's the exact situation actor and model Shahjehan Khan ran into with the recent release of NetherRealm Studios' Mortal Kombat 1. In a delightfully charming TikTok feature with WBZ News Radio's Matt Shearer, the Boston native recounted his experience becoming the face of Quan Chi, a longtime character reinvented for the series' soft reboot as a DLC character.
In a catchup call with Game Developer Khan described the experience as somewhat overwhelming—in a good way! "It was kind of like feeling [everything] at the same time," he laughed. He said in the last 2 years it's felt like his career has begun to really surge, with more regular gigs with his punk band The Kominas and an appearance on season 4 of the HBO TV show Succession.
Seeing his face—right down to a recognizable birthmark—recreated in a series he loved as a child was a "super cool" experience but it's also "a super scary thing" for his profession, he told Shearer. For a one-time fee Khan (knowingly and willingly, he stressed in our call) signed away his face to NetherRealm and its parent company Warner Bros. Games for the purposes of portraying Quan Chi. The studio and publisher can now use it to make millions in profits for Mortal Kombat 1's lifecycle.
Khan admitted in
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