Those are certainly lower scores than I expected.
I think people are mixing up "critical failure" with "bad game." When you spend a certain amount of money making a game, when you have a lot of confidence in your ideas, when your developer has a track record this outstanding, you expect a certain degree of quality to your game. When this game's critical reception is inconsistent with the team's track record, even failing to outscore their weakest project for more than a decade, you might be disappointed. You might say the game failed to live up to your expectations critically.
It doesn't mean the game is bad, or that players aren't enjoying it. It just means most people probably expected critics to like it more than they liked ODST.
Or it means Microsoft stopped signing the checks.
If Wii U Zelda got a 75 Metascore, I wouldn't hesitate to call it a critical failure, because it is made by a developer with a track record for excellence, and that is what I expect from them. I have no expectations from Bungie because I don't care about Halo, so I'm happy to let their fans decide whether or not this game is a "critical failure."
