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• At the top of the rich list is Borderland chairman ‘Handsome Jack’ with an equally handsome salary of £333,043 a year.
• Super Mario ranks among the lowest paid, earning £32,895 a year on a typical plumber’s salary in Italy.
• Pac-Man earns the lowest salary of any character as a security guard in Japan, bringing in just £15,916 a year.

From Super Mario to Lara Croft, have you ever wondered where your favorite video game protagonists and villains would rank in the real job market?

Online gaming platform Solitaired took a look at some of the world’s most iconic video game characters and calculated how much each would earn if they landed their dream job in the real world. They based character earnings on data from salary comparison sites as well as publicly available pay brackets to find an average annual salary for more than 50 video game characters.

Top earnings from video games

1. Handsome Jack, Borderlands 2

At the forefront is Borderland’s narcissistic villain Handsome Jack, who would take home £333,043 a year as CEO of a company. While Hyperion Corp has thankfully not been founded yet, it seems only fitting that as the fictional president of an intergalactic weapons manufacturer and supplier, Jack walks away with such a huge salary.

2. Solid Snake, Metal Gear Solid

In second place is Metal Gear Solid’s eye patch wearing Solid Snake, who would earn an impressive £107,517 a year as a US Army Special Forces soldier. Snake, who boasts an impressive military career, was first inducted into the Green Berets during his teenage years before later joining Big Boss’s special forces unit, FOXHOUND, meaning he would be paid substantially for his specialized skills acquired.

3. Albert Wesker, Resident Evil

In third place is Resident Evil’s Albert Wesker, who reportedly earns a salary of £90,519 a year as a virologist. Graduating at age 17 with a doctorate in virology, Wesker began his training at Umbrella Pharmaceuticals and was later transferred to the Arklay laboratory as a senior researcher working on the t-Virus project, following the dissolution of his training school.

4. Alex Mason, Call of Duty

In fourth place is Call of Duty veteran and fan favorite Alex Mason. Mason is unlikely to struggle to remember those numbers, as he racks up an impressive £82,317 a year as an intelligence analyst for the CIA. Mason, who makes his first appearance as a main playable character in Call of Duty: Black Ops, joined the CIA’s Operation 40 team in 1958 and continued to perform several missions for the CIA despite his imprisonment and his brainwashing in Vorkuta.

5. Max Payne, Max Payne

In fifth place is titular action avenger Max Payne, who reportedly earns £75,922 a year as a police detective in New York. Payne began his law enforcement career in the 1990s, working for the NYPD as a detective before joining fellow DEA Alex Balder in the Valkyr drug case, following the brutal murder of his wife and of his daughter in 1998.

The 20 highest earning video game characters

Rank	video game character	Video game	Job/Occupation	Annual salary (£)	Annual salary ($)
1.	Handsome Jack	Borderlands 2	CEO	£333,043	$432,524
2.	solid snake	Solid metal gear	special forces soldier	£107,517	$139,632
3.	Albert Wester	resident Evil	Virologist	£90,519	$117,557
4.	Alexander Mason	Call of Duty	CIA officer	£82,317	$106,905
5.	Max Payne	Max Payne	NYPD detective	£75,922	$98,600
6.	Cole Phelps	The black	LAPD Detective	£71,846	$93,306
7.	Gordon Freeman	half-life	Research associate scientist	£70,145	$91,097
8.	Arthur Morgan	Red Dead Redemption 2	Bounty hunter	£69,750	$90,585
9.	gothic mortimer	The Sims	Scientific	£69,076	$89,709
ten.	isaac clark	dead space	Engineer	£64,859	$84,232
11.	Duke Nukem	Duke Nukem	CIA Special Agent	£62,837	$81,607
12.	CJ Johnson	grand theft auto san andreas	Entrepreneur	£59,626	$77,436
13.	bella gothic	The Sims	intelligence researcher	£58,363	$75,796
14.	Michael DeSanta	Grand Theft Auto V	Film producer	£54,563	$70,861
15.	Leon Kennedy	resident Evil	Police officer	£54,113	$70,276
16.	homer simpson	Simpson Hit and Run	Nuclear Technician	£53,629	$69,648
17.	master chef	Halo	Master Chief Petty Officer	£53,491	$69,469
18.	doom killer	Loss	Marine Artillery Master Sergeant	£53,490	$69,468
19.	Sam Fisher	Burst cell	Navy Seal	£48,729	$63,284
20.	Chris Redfield and Jill Valentine	resident Evil	SWAT team member	£48,158	$62,543

Lowest earning video games

1. Pac-Man, Pac-Man

At the bottom of the list, Pac-Man takes the lowest earning spot, earning just £15,916 a year as a security guard in Japan – where the character got his start. While the creators don’t make it clear that Pac-Man has a job on its own, the role seems fitting given that Namco’s classic shows the yellow sprite navigating mazes trying to get rid of unwanted ghostly intruders.

2. Link, The Legend of Zelda

Second from bottom is Legend of Zelda hero and protagonist Link, who would earn just £19,661 a year as a knight – if the job were to still exist. A knight was paid an average of two shillings a day during the 1200s, meaning Link would take home just over £19,000 when factoring in currency conversions and rising inflation.

3. Cloud Strife, Final Fantasy VII

The third lowest earner is Cloud Strife from the Final Fantasy series who is said to earn £19,964 a year as a Private First Class in the US Army. Cloud failed to join SOLDIER, becoming a Shinra infantryman instead, thus justifying our sword fighter’s lower pay bracket.

4. Desmond Miles, Assassin’s Creed

As the fourth-lowest earner on the list, Assassin’s Creed main character Desmond Miles is said to earn just £21,408 a year as a bartender in New York. Desmond, who is descended from a long line of assassins, used his training to hitchhike to New York, where he worked as a bartender at Bad Weather before his eventual capture.

5. Ryu, street fighter

Fifth from the bottom is the main character of the Street Fighter series, Ryu, who would make just £21,723 as a martial arts instructor in Japan. Ryu made his first appearance in Capcom’s original Street Fighter game in 1987, and while his name roughly translates to “abundant” in Japanese, the same can’t be said for his expected salary.

The 20 lowest paid video game characters

Rank	video game character	Video game	Job/Occupation	Annual salary (£)	Annual salary ($)
1	Pac man	Pac man	Security guard	£15,916	$20,670
2	Link	The Legend of Zelda	Knight	£19,661	$25,533
3	cloud conflict	Final Fantasy	private first class	£19,964	$25,927
4	Miles Desmond	Assassin’s Creed	Bartender	£21,408	$27,802
5	Ryu	street fighter	martial arts instructor	£21,723	$28,212
6	Marcus Fenix	armament of war	army sergeant	£24,119	$31,324
7	Don Lothaire	The Sims	Medical intern	£24,784	$32,187
8	Geralt of Rivia	the witcher	pest controller	£24,906	$32,345
9	Niko Bellic	Grand Theft Auto IV	Taxi driver	£25,521	$33,144
ten	Flash	Final Fantasy	Security guard	£29,084	$37,771
11	Crash Bandicoot	Crash Bandicoot	Bodyguard	£29,670	$38,533
12	John Marston	Red Dead Redemption	Rancher	£32,770	$42,559
13	mario	Super Mario Bros.	Plumber	£32,895	$42,721
14	Tom Nook	animal crossing	Real estate agent	£33,812	$43,912
15	Isabella	animal crossing	secretary	£34,071	$44,248
16	Freddy Fazbear	Five nights at Freddy’s	Mascot	£35,078	$45,556
17	Captain John ‘Soap’ MacTavish	Call of Duty 4 Modern Warfare	army sergeant	£35,953	$46,692
18	Booker DeWitt	Bioshock Infinite	Private detective	£36,000	$46,753
19	spyro	Spyro the Dragon	Jeweler	£36,516	$47,424
20	sonic the hedgehog	sonic the hedgehog	professional athlete	£36,592	$47,522

Honorable mentions

Some character wins meant they ranked elsewhere on the list, but some are so iconic it would be a shame to miss them altogether.

Given Super Mario’s Of Italian descent, he is said to earn a salary of £32,895 working as a plumber in Italy, ranking him 41^st in the list. Elsewhere in Europe, the female lead of Tomb Raider Lara Croft rows 27^andearning a salary of £41,998 as a British archaeologist.

While sonic the hedgehog is not currently looking for a job, due to his ability to run at supersonic speeds it is only fitting that he earns a salary of £36,592 as a professional athlete. Though he might have to wait a few years before he can win, as the creators suggest he’s only 15.

Pokemon Pikachu would be perfectly suited for detective work given his latest film role, earning him £37,282 a year – although given his elemental type he would also make an excellent electrician. His trainer and best friend, Ash Ketchumwould only top Pikachu’s earnings, earning £41,327 as a researcher for Professor Cherry.

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