Never Thought I'd Say It (May Contain Spoilers)Halo 4 is absolutely disappointing. It did a few things right, but I've picked out one too many things that 343 did to make me dislike this sequel

Campaign:
The campaign doesn't start out so bad. The first level feels very reminiscent of Halo 2's introduction: Fighting aliens in space. The drop from the Forward Unto Dawn onto Requiem feels a lot like the start of Halo 3. After that, the story becomes riddled with plot holes and shortcuts leading to a very depressing and short campaign.

Three friends and I finished co-op campaign on Heroic in four hours. That's unheard of. I've seen cries of "Play it on Legendary" or "Do it solo!" A single player camp...

Never Thought I'd Say It (May Contain Spoilers)Halo 4 is absolutely disappointing. It did a few things right, but I've picked out one too many things that 343 did to make me dislike this sequel

Campaign:
The campaign doesn't start out so bad. The first level feels very reminiscent of Halo 2's introduction: Fighting aliens in space. The drop from the Forward Unto Dawn onto Requiem feels a lot like the start of Halo 3. After that, the story becomes riddled with plot holes and shortcuts leading to a very depressing and short campaign.

Three friends and I finished co-op campaign on Heroic in four hours. That's unheard of. I've seen cries of "Play it on Legendary" or "Do it solo!" A single player campaign should feel substantial regardless of what difficulty you're playing. If the only thing you can do to increase the length of the campaign is to up the difficulty, it's too short. Past Halo titles, with or without co-op, usually take me all day to finish.

And the final boss is a fucking quicktime event. Bullshit.

Spartan Ops:
Whomever at 343 made the decision for Spartan Ops to replace Firefight needs to be kicked in the teeth. Spartan Ops is nothing more than a series of five minute co-op missions in which your hand is held like a five-year-old, and it suffers from the same "Higher Difficulty = More Play Time" formula as the campaign. It doesn't beat headshotting scores of Grunts for ten to twenty minutes just to blow off steam.

War Games (Multiplayer):
And this is where it gets ugly. Why did 343 have to follow the path of Call of Duty? Killcams, Killstreaks, no weapon drops...when did ANY of this happen in a Halo title?

I'll start with the Loadout and Ranking Systems. They follow the Black Ops fomula of "Rank up, spent points, get guns" and offer a set of customizable loadouts for you to start with...WHY?! This completely breaks the norm of all players starting with equal gear and having the same odds of getting a power weapon as anyone else. Instead, certain starting weapons outclass others. Using an assault rifle? You're fucked since I can guarantee that everyone else will be using a DMR or a Battle Rifle. And what the hell is this about being slowed down when you take damage while sprinting? I though the purpose of sprinting was to retreat as well as attack...so much for that.

Ranks in Reach were good. Using the credits you earn to buy purely cosmetic gear was nice, as no one was left at a disadvantage and a new player had the same amount of tricks at his disposal as a veteran. Not anymore. Now all the high level players have a distinct advantage, making it much harder for new players to jump in.

Weapon Markers...I hate this so much. It's absolutely irritating for a little marker to pop up and see everyone dogpile you in an attempt to get a shotgun. And the need for a perk to allow you to pickup grenades? What is this shit? Grenades don't kill in one hit. I suppose in the future no one knows how to pick things up.

Killcams. They have to go. They're buggy and can't keep up with the player speed and amount of action on the screen, resulting in direct hits look like wildly inaccurate shots that by some miracle hit the target.

End Rating: 4/10
All of the stuff I've mentioned has sabotaged the one thing I wanted and the one thing I was worried about: For Halo 4 to feel like Halo. Big maps, an epic campaign, and hours of fun. I can see it was what 343 was shooting for, but all of these little changes to make Halo more customizable, fast-paced, and accessible have ruined it for me.

If 343 doesn't promise anything new for Halo 5 or make some radical patches in the future, I'm gonna start putting this franchise in the same box as Call of Duty. The "Games I Will Never Play Again" Box.