I too was disappointed in the game, overall. After watching the teasers and E3 movies for months, I was looking forward to being blown away by the technological masterpiece that Halo 2 was touted to be. I didn't fall into the hype trap, no, I was expecting more on the technical level. The only things about the game that I found exceptional were the environmental sound effects and Marty O'Donnell's musical score. He's a genius. The graphics, they were choppy, low-res images all the sudden popping into high-res when you get close to them, that's gay. Jagged edges on everything when you're zoomed in - ridiculous. The first game was just soooo smooth, graphics-wise. I would have rather H2 used the same quality of graphics in H1 than what they did here. The "improvements" they made don't quite seem to offset the flaws enough for my liking. One thing I miss is the health bar, especially in multiplayer. I used to gauge how "healthy" I was when I was attacking, so that if I was fairly evenly matched with a foe, I could break off my attack and take cover before I died. The new shields/health thing sucks, IMO, plus, I don't like it at the bottom over the gaydar. I don't like the new menu system. I find it clumsy and awkward. The H1 menus were so straightforward and simple. I do like being able to adjust controller settings inside the match though. That is a nice improvement. In single-player mode, I don't like how you switch sides during the game. The story could have been told (better) differently if you played the campaign through once as one side, and then again as the other side, similar to how Star Wars: Battlefront does it. It was difficult for me to be in the mindframe of the main character in one storyline and then all of the sudden, cutscene, and now I am a different player and have to take a few seconds to rewind the story in my head, remember my objectives, what weapons I'm holding, where I'm at on the map, etc.
I could go on, but this is getting long enough. Bottom line, I did like the game, but it didn't live up to my expectations of a game that's been in dev for three years. Sorry, but I have to give this a 7/10.
(BTW, for the post that mentioned how MC and Cortana's voice sounded different when they were in the bomb area, that's supposed to sound that way. It is because they are out in SPACE, not inside the ship.)
