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  • Ace Attorney:
    • Jack Hammer in the third case of Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney. It turns out that he accidentally killed his co-star and Dee Vasquez—whose partner was the co-star in question—covered it up, forcing him to take on villains' roles in children's shows for low pay as revenge.
    • Wendy Oldbag was also a star in her younger days (or, as she referred to herself, a little twinkle between the stars). Now she's a security guard for the studio.
  • One of the Splicers in the BioShock series is Baby Jane, who's clearly one of these from her dialogue: "Came here to be a star! Came here to be a star - Not too late, not too late!" (She might never have been a star, though, having simply opted to fake until she could make it — and never did.)
    • Bonus points for being clones of the original Baby Jane, due to Adam overdose and memory overwrite. 'Shadow of her former self' is an understatement.
  • Cyberpunk 2077: Kerry still has some star power, as one of the Grand Old Men of Chromatic Rock, but at the time of the game he spends most of his time holed up in his house, surrounded by empty bottles, half-eaten takeout and relics from the past, avoiding his family and pining for the Glory Days.
  • Bibi Swan from Dead Rising 2, a former Vegas stage starlet who got old and ended up in Vegas knock-off Fortune City. She's now got a literally captive audience (i.e. the zombies ate most of her audience, she went insane and took several random people as hostage to serve as her new audience, which she also considers the zombies to be a part of), and makes Chuck run "errands" for her to set up her show, threatening to blow herself and her audience up if he doesn't humor her. If you humor her and help her with her show, she ends up jumping into a crowd of zombies, thinking they're her rabid fans, allowing you to either leave her there to be eaten by them or save her after you free her hostages, at which point she finally comes to her senses.
  • HuniePop 2 reveals that this has happened to Jesse Maye. Now that she is approaching her 40s, offers for her in adult movies have reduced drastically and she was forced to quit. She's described as being depressed about it and yearning for some attention through flirting, hoping to be shown that she is still attractive.
  • Erick "Chowder Man" Helman from Hypnospace Outlaw is a washed up rock star working for Merchantsoft. While he was famous back in the day, all he does now is write cheesy (but legitimately catchy) jingles for advertisers. However, he does want to make a big comeback with his band KRUNCHER at the Coolfest '99 concert. Unfortunately, his comeback ends up becoming a failure. He gets into a helicopter accident at the concert, which kills his drummer and causes Helman to lose his leg.
  • Mortal Kombat 1's incarnation of Johnny Cage is a Hollywood action star, but despite his massive ego and confident attitude, it's clear that his career has been on a downward slump, and he's been struggling to come to terms with it. His story mode chapter begins with him filming an Indiana Jones-like film and has him pitching a tetralogy and streaming series, but he's rejected, with it later being revealed that Johnny only got his role because the director owed him a favor. Combined with his habitual spending to "show off" his wealth, it's also revealed that Johnny's going flat broke, and this combination of factors leads his wife to break up with him. By the end of the game — after a series of death-defying adventures in Outworld and helping Liu Kang and co. save the multiverse — things start to look up as he pitches to Liu Kang a cinematic universe based on their experiences, helping gradually ease Earthrealm into understanding the multi-realm conflict they've always been a part of and (conveniently) giving him some extra bankroll.
  • Momoka in Omega Quintet is on her way to becoming one, retiring after the first episode, her hand being forced not by lack of appeal (though Ayumi claims they had been avoiding close-ups without telling her) - she still gets plenty of fans. It's old age, which not only gives her trouble in the physical combat against MADs, but it's a small miracle her Magic Music has continued to function this far beyond the Competence Zone as it is. She's self-aware of all this, and rather than denying it, she's incredibly bitter, bullying her replacements, refusing to give them any training whatsoever, and generally acting like a diva despite having no life skills in a Crapsack World. It turns out to be at least partially rooted in self-loathing after she overestimated her abilities as a mentor and nearly got her first pupil killed making her debut too early. She starts to mellow out - eventually - when she's convinced Takt and the Quintet can look after themselves.
  • Eve from The Outfoxies used to live it big as a film starlet, but was especially unlucky - even though she's just 29, she's now considered a "has-been". Unfortunately, she has turned to illegal measures, such as theft and murder, to continue living the high life.
  • Madame Flurrie from Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, although her acting background isn't mentioned much after she joins your party. Although she returns to the stage in the epilogue.
  • Gloria von Gouten from Psychonauts, though her decline was a result of her mother's suicide rather than a harsh industry, though that certainly didn't help. She's incredibly bipolar and delusional (performing for a collection of pots with faces drawn on them) until Raz goes into her mind and helps her control her mood swings. Her mother was also this, and it was Gloria's success outshining her own that led to her jumping off a building. When Raz fixes her mental issues, she decides to retire from acting permanently (which she never really wanted to do in the first place, having been pushed into it by her Stage Mom).
  • Evelyn Morrison, B-movie actress turned motel owner, from Sam & Max Hit the Road. She's actually also a bit of a subversion; while most of the usual trappings of the trope is present (thinks she's still famous and iconic, thinks she was a much bigger star than she really was, acts as if a comeback is right around the corner), she's also a successful business owner, which is a popular destination for Bigfoot, implied to be because of her b-movie status (she claims she's used to dealing with hairy monsters from her film career).
  • Naoko Mihama from the Siren 1 is a former model and actress reduced to B-list status. She ends up going crazy due to the horrifying situation she finds herself in, and, combined with her vanity, she willingly allows herself to become a shibito in a misguided attempt to stay eternally young and beautiful. Following her transformation, she is first seen as a regular shibito, before eventually mutating into a dog shibito.
  • Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines
    • Gary Golden is a male example. Having lost both his career and his good looks when the local Nosferatu Embraced him, much of his spare time is spent dressed up in a tuxedo, conducting "wrap parties" with the corpses of long-dead actors, and occasionally trying to remind visitors that he was once a Hollywood star. Aside from that, though, he's pretty happy with his position.
    • Quite perversely, Gary has created one himself: Imalia, a former model who grew too arrogant for the local Nosferatu to stomach. Following her Embrace, she has become obsessed with the models who have taken her place on the spotlight, to the point of paying the Player Character to disgrace one of them. She'll also pay a lot for any footage (especially pornographic) of herself in her Glory Days, most of which Gary has spitefully removed from the public market.
    • Another male actor: Ash, an actor who was being groomed by Isaac, one of the local Toreador, as a hot leading man. Then Isaac found Ash overdosed one night and Embraced him — leading to the death of his acting career and a major case of I Hate You, Vampire Dad. Ash spends his nights running a club gifted to him by Isaac and trading on the last fragments of his movie career, but refuses to have anything to do with his sire — which is sad, because Isaac really does care for him.
  • The Walking Dead (Telltale): Javier Garcia from A New Frontier is a former pro baseball player who was blacklisted from the league due to betting on himself. As shown in a flashback when he visits a batting cage with his brother David, he misses playing the game, and a fan who recognizes him only wants his autograph because signatures from blacklisted players are worth more online ("I can get $10 for this!"), though he really starts wishing he was still playing when he finds out his father has cancer, as he could easily have paid for treatment if he was still in the League. Ironically, his baseball skills and general athleticism becomes very handy during the Zombie Apocalypse, and another survivor even recognizes him, despite years having passed.

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