Agreed, that's way too high for London. London does pay more compared to the rest of the UK but a typical web developer with 3yrs experience does not get £90k for working in London. I've seen under half that for cool startups and never above 2/3rds that for someone with only 3 years experience.

But then a contractor can earn much more. The low end is £350 per day up to around £650 per day.

That's comparing apples and oranges though. Salaries are usually lower than contractor rates because they're more dependable, they include office costs and overheads, etc.

The base pay seems a bit high, but the location adjustment seems a bit paltry in comparison.

Overall, it's certainly high to me, but gamedev isn't exactly known to pay well.

I searched around a while on job sites ...

The range for "entry level" jobs pays $35,000 - $50,000 .

Experienced ( 5+ years ) .... $60,000 - $85,000 .

Management positions $95,000 - $140,000 .

All this depends on where you live, and are willing to travel.

India is hiring for $400 - $1,200 a month !

Looking at these shining numbers, I can only wonder what shit I should put up with to have this god-forsaken salary... I earn less than 60% of what's displayed there (and I modestly ranked my skill at 1 just to be safe).

then again, need to factor the cost of living and rent (tell that to the people who work at google!!)

I searched around a while on job sites ...

The range for "entry level" jobs pays $35,000 - $50,000 .

Experienced ( 5+ years ) .... $60,000 - $85,000 .

Management positions $95,000 - $140,000 .

All this depends on where you live, and are willing to travel.

India is hiring for $400 - $1,200 a month !

Way back when I exited school in 1995 in the United States in a region with approximately median cost of living, we had some statistics taken from the student body. The CS department was the only group where the statistics for employment was "1", as in 100% had jobs or job offers. The CS department's self-reported wages at graduation were in the $55,000 to $60,000 range fresh from school, unlike the other departments where students were in the $30K, $45K, and similar ranges.

The Game Developer Salary Survey has been running strong for many years now. Here's the 2016 numbers for programmers, with averages for the US:

* Game programmer, under 3 years experience: $72,000

* Non-lead, non-senior, non-management game programmer with 6+ years experience, $105,000

They have some regional variation (Silicon Valley and NYC are more money) and they don't publicly break down their survey into bigger ranges. Those with 10+ years experience tend to make even more and cross above $120K, and those long-career numbers are on par with what I saw on the stack overflow site.

There are far too many people in this industry who accept lowball offers. They're often thinking "I don't care how low you pay me, please give me a job in this field." Of course companies will be glad to hire you if you accept far less than you should be earning. The company runs a risk that when you discover the wages you will leave, but for them it is cheap labor.

Figure out what salary you are worth, figure out how to justify it, and then negotiate well with the company.

It's a lot compared to the UK - well, maybe I'm being ripped off (I've only had one full time job, so haven't looked around at rates in years), but the general perception is that the US pays a lot more (and I don't work in finance).

OTOH I'm thankful to have a reasonable amount of holiday, I can't put a price on that. And I'm still paid far more than the median in the UK, so I'm not complaining.

"There are far too many people in this industry who accept lowball offers."

But all the people commenting earning less seem to not be in the US, so statistics about the US are meaningless. It's nothing to do with accepting lowball offers.

The Game Developer Salary Survey has been running strong for many years now. Here's the 2016 numbers for programmers, with averages for the US:

.

That site's numbers are not matching what I am finding with job postings ... maybe they are pulling figures from high paying areas, or 'future projected pay' statistics ?

I spent more time rummaging around many different employment websites ... the newest 120 listings for "entry level" came back under $48,000 .

Could you post a real job listing for "entry level programmer" at $72,000? I am unable to find anything legitimate.

I spent more time rummaging around many different employment websites ... the newest 120 listings for "entry level" came back under $48,000 .

If they need to advertise like that for an entry level game developer they're probably not a great place to work at. All my recent employers have had enough of a steady stream of applicants to keep the jobs filled with quality workers.

The actual pay always depends on the negotiation, but our fresh graduates (in Austin) earn around $60K and get a moderate raise at the end of the first year. Before that, at my prior employer (in Salt Lake City) our part time CS students generally started at least $20/hr (equivalent to $40K annually if it were full time) with a large increase to around $60K upon graduation and joining us full time.

Here is an article on salary bands at major companies: https://blog.step.com/2016/04/08/an-open-source-project-for-tech-salaries/