Sure, there are good games that aren't high budget.  I think you have a good point, my kids love open world.  Lots of good options these days.  I let my kids play halo but not CoD.

Nope, I haven't, but I'm flattered that someone would say that!

Talking to the taxi drivers in A Case of Distrust is a treasured memory of mine. Those convos in particular add so much texture and perspective to the setting. I also just love the premise and the particular way the game is written.

I'm sorry dude but this post literally made me laugh out loud cause ummmm... it's ridiculous.

I don't know what copyright law has to do with this. Disney owns the copyright. It is for their protection, not the fans'. I seriously doubt you care in the least bit whether or not Disney is loyal to their copyright. I have no idea why it was ok for Disney to change the original version but they cannot change their own version. Literally makes zero sense. And, as discussed like seven times already, changes are constantly made to copyrighted characters in pretty much every regard, and generally do not cause this kind of kerfuffle. There are few characters that are the same as they were in 1989. 

Ariel is the Little Mermaid, a version of the character from the original fairy tale, whether or not she was named Ariel in that. But, we can throw that aside, because I've already rebutted this argument. Quasimodo was Quasimodo in the original story, and Esmeralda was Esmeralda. These were characters that existed, were named, and were completely changed for the Disney version making the story literally the opposite of what it had been. Tons of other examples, but the one people are upset about is the Little Mermaid where pretty much nothing is changed about the 1989 story except for the skin color of the protagonist. So I guess skin color is more important than personality, plot, theme, or anything like that.

Nobody is taking away representation from red headed white girls. If I have a white red headed daughter and she wants to see a character that looks like her, you know what I'll do? Put on the animated Little Mermaid for her. It still exists. Wasn't taken off Disney Plus, and Disney hasn't come around to destroy my VHS copy. There is literally the exact same amount of representation of red headed girls who look like Alyssa Milano as there was before. If you think representation is important, well now we have two groups represented. I'll probably be sticking to the original, but I'm genuinely happy that black girls have a character they may see themselves more in, because representation does matter. 

Michael Jordan is an actual person. This is not even vaguely a similar situation, and does not deserve a response beyond lol.

As for the purpose of the change, I don't really care. I see no reason for Disney has to make the movie exactly how it was before. The decision to cast for diversity, if that was the motivation, or to stick to the original animation are equally arbitrary to me, and Disney should do whatever they feel like will make for the best movie or, more realistically their motivation, the most money. The story is not inherently better with a white mermaid or a black mermaid. And whatever the motivation behind it, Hailey Bailey absolutely looks like a Disney Princess and has a lovely voice that actually sounds fairly similar to Jodi Benson. So, what is the issue here? She seems very well qualified for the part. Well, except for one thing to certain people...

Your argument about "vibe" and "natural understanding" is similarly ridiculous. I've pointed out numerous examples, all ignored, of Disney and other companies completely changing the stories they base their work of. And nobody ever gives a shit. Let's stop pretending it's hard to understand where this "line" or "vibe" or "natural understanding" is. These reactions basically only happen when a change relates to race, gender, or sexuality. And, as pointed out earlier, it doesn't always have to be a change. They could be new characters in an existing franchise (Ghostbusters/Star Wars) or completely original characters (Turning Red) it doesn't matter. 

This is just an example of reaching and scraping the bottom of the barrel, pulling out the most absurd arguments, to pretend there is some sort of philosophical objection. but there isn't. The problem is not vague or ephemeral. If the problem was changing source material, then people would be more upset the more the source material is changed. But that's not what's happening. People are more upset with the little Mermaid being black, a purely cosmetic change in this case, than they are when other characters have their personality completely altered. 

You did at least end on a correct note though. There were a lot of angry people. And the reason is indeed very understandable. Racism.

I think Anita Sarkeesian is not a gamer. Or at least she was not when she started criticising video games. There is video proof of her saying as much. I think she is a grifter who stole a lot of money, since she overpromised and underdelivered through her video series she got all these donations for. I think the videos she produced are shallow, poorly researched and should barely even count as critique. I think this did not warrent the hate and even death threats she got. I see her influence on video games as mostly negative.

The Ariel discussion is interesting and I happen to also have an opinion about that:

I don't like the change. Not because I don't like black people. But because it is such clear pandering. It gets an eye-roll out of me, but nothing more. I wont watch it, because most if not all the Disney remakes are horrible. So far so good.

What I hate is selectiv outrage. The hypocracy is quite nasty. Because it would be a huge surprise to me if a big company dared to whitewash a character. -See, there is even a derogatory term for changing some charakter's race to be white. Imagine the shitstorm if a company made Shaft, Black Panther, Blade, or even historical figures white. They could never. And I get that these companies have first and foremost financial interests that they have to protect. So I get why such changes would never be made by them. And that is alright.
But I do have a big problem with peoples responses and attitudes: "Changing Ariel from white to black is fine and should be fine. But changing Melcolm X (a real person, I know, but again, it worked fine the other way around) or even something obscure like The Nutty Professor (Eddy Murphy) to being white, is almost equivalent to a hate crime."

There are quite funny memes about this sorry state of affairs. I recommend to google "polar bears by Netflix", or "Rosa Parks by Netflix".

In conclusion: if a change from white to anything is generally accepted (I know, some do not) but a change from anything to white could never even be done, something is wrong.

-A good counter example to this would be the change in Dr Strange's teacher from being tibetan to being celtic (white). But I think this was more so because of China and Tibet. And the outrage was not as strong because they changed a man to a woman. That might have canceled it out a bit.

https://www.indiewire.com/gallery/hollywood-whitewashing-25-roles-emma-stone-jake-gyllenhaal-scarlett-johansson/

.___.

Still pissed they cast Scarllet Johanson to play Motoko  

There are 2 major things I want to adress here. The first is the list of examples you provided through the link:

Nobody gave a crap about the source materials (if there even is one?) or the real events inspiring the following movies: warm bodies, a mighty heart, wanted, the human stain, argo, drive, whisky tango foxtrot, speed racer, exodus: gods and monsters (is there even a source material (other than the bible of course)?), aloha, a beautiful mind, 21, the lone ranger, 30 days of night, the social network (people care about Zuck alright, but not about anybody else), stuck, edge of tomorrow. When people don't care about the source it becomes infinitely easier to do (to whitewash). 

To the ones people do care about:

Prince of Persia: Jake totally looks the part, making it way easier to swollow the change. And it released 13 years ago.

Dragon Ball Evolution: it got everything wrong and cannot be taken seriously as an adaptation anyways. And it released 14 years ago.

Batman Begins: Liam could pass as arab. And it released 18 years ago.

Death Note: it got almost everything wrong and cannot be taken seriously as an adaptation. And when you change setting, it is logical (though not necessary) to also change character ethnicity. 

The Last Airbender: it got almost everything wrong and cannot be taken seriously as an adaptation. Also M Night changed all the races around in a wild mix. It was not just making people white.

Pan: released 8 years ago.

Ghost in the Shell: released 6 years ago. You seem to be a fan so correct me if I am wrong, but was it not so in the movie that Scarlettsl's character was supposed to be asian? She had an accident and her mind was transformed into a different (artigicial?) body. It was an asian ghost in an artificial shell. And that shell did not look particularly asian in the anime. (In Jin Roh characters are actually drawn to look asian for example.)

Dr Strange: I gave that very example (Tilda) in my comment above as a counter to myself.

I will say this, accounting for the examples of whitewashing you provided, correcting my initial comment: it can be done. But surely not to a character on the level Ariel. Really do imagine a white Blade for a second. -Thats right. The backlash would mean financial ruin for the company. Which leads me neatly into my second point.

My second major point would be this: I don't care much about whitewashing or changing races otherwise. I care about selective outrage. About double standards. So you only have half an argument posting a link about the worst cases of Hollywood whitewashing. Next you would have to find me an article from a major outlet dicussing the worst cases of blackwashing. Because it would mean that not only changing to white, but to anything from anything is seen as a problem. Otherwise you would have to find me an article of a major news outlet discussing how whitewashing is as little a problem as changing from white to other races. Than you would have a point.

Blablablabla 

Withewahsing happens, quite frequently actually. Hollywood was quite found to it, it's becoming less common because minorities have purchasing power now. The idea of whiteashing is the same when you turn LGBT character non LGBT, Fried Green Tomatoes, great movie, but still they "straightwashed" the two main characters. Sometimes the whitewashing happens just because it's easier and less expensive to cast white people, they are the majority in USA media anyways. I only bring a list of Hollywood movies, but in Harry Potter Lavender Brown was cast as a black woman up to the fifth movie, and magically turned white on the sixth. Albeit the book never stated whether Lavender was white, black or whatever it was a ironic decision producers originally introduced her as black when her roles were close to irrelevant, but turned her white when she finally had lines and screen time. 

 The change is Motoko's story was done in a way it would have some logical explanation for her being white, but it sounds and an obviously excuse: They wanted an hyped actress to bring Avengers fans into the franchise. This is again whitewashing on its full form. The Last Airbender characters being all white is not only a matter of the movie sucking hard, but a lack of confidence that people would connect with asian actors. Again, there is no word for it other than whitewashing. I'm a huge Avatar fan and I remember my immediate facepalm when seeing the movie the first time, does anybody ever think Katara as a white girl? Like... at all? 

Changes in source material are quite common, most Disney stories are nothing but botched versions of their originals stories, changes to be appealing to mainstream audiences. Chinese people specially hates Mulan because of the changes Disney in the lore. 

How big is anyone threshold for accepting and supporting changing is personal bussines, but @JWeinCom  explained quite well how the recent backslash in changes on source material mostly happens when it comes to minorities because it immediately takes political undertones. The same way in past Hollywood wanted their casts to be all white straight people because it used to help than to sell, now they want diversity in ethnicity and sexuality for the very same reasons. 

People tolerated far more drastic changes in source material when it comes to background stories, actions and personalities of characters, for instance Star wars prequel, people were outranging about changes in source material, sure, Anakin being so different from Vader was a point many fans complained, but it was never seen as a political treat that needs to be systematically boycotted and destroyed  

Overall, conservative people is inclined to not bother with whitewashing, because it's pandering to them. But they go crazy when Hollywood start to pander minorities. I watched The LM live action, It was boring, but the Ariel is identical in everything to the animation except skin color. I'm sure "anti woke" people wouldn't mind she's to be a completely different character as long she looks identical (i.e. being white and redhaired) to the original 

This is actually not really the topic of this thread. Adjacent perhaps, but not really. Therefore I am done here. But I will make a new thread, specifically about whitewashing. I will answer you there in the op and would invite you for further discussion, even though I did not much appreciate your dismissive tone at the beginning of your last reply.

1. Willem Dafoe played Jesus.  I dare you to find a character on that level to gripe about, because Ariel is completely out of her depth when compared to that level of historical and cultural significance. 

2. Then your response will be evaluated with this in mind.