I've been approached by a large console video game company about licensing some of my action video for use in a new console game. I'd like to get some suggestions about what some of the going rates might be. (per second/minute/clip). I've never licensed video like this and have no clue what the rate might be. The details are very few. I think they are trying to get an idea right now if they can afford to include it in their game.

As everybody knows... I'd hate to charge too much and have them walk, but I don't want to sell myself short either. Any help would be much appreciated.

My practice includes representation of a several large video game developers. I can't provide specific guidelines for how much you should charge, but you might consider this: budgets (and the production process) for a video game are very similar to those for independent film production. An "A-list" game typically costs $10-20 million to produce over an 18-24 month development cycle. I'm aware of some games that cost as much as $30 million and I know of at least one that is budgeted at $40 million. Obviously, how much you charge depends on how central your footage would be to the game, as well as how much of it is used.

Is it the publisher or the developer? If it's the publisher you will be able to charge a lot more since they have the deep pockets. Developer's will try to get the lowest price possible.