I first played Halo on the Xbox(did quiet a bit of coop split screen with a friend too.) It was an average game, and the series still is average to this day. I did however, understand that it was a special game for a console. There were always better FPS than Halo, there are better FPS than Halo 3, and there will already be FPS better than Reach, but not everybody has hundreds of dollars to spend on a decent PC, and I understand that.

My computer back then also handled Halo just fine when it came out for PC, but then again, I lived in the US.

What FPS games were/are objectively better than Halo? Subjectively any opinion is worth as much as any other.

There are a lot, the problem is a lot of people have childhood goggles, kinda like me with NES, when you are younger, you really don't give much rat's ass about the actual quality of a product. One thing Halo is defintely good at is that it's accessible, other than that, there really isn't anything truly special about it vs FPS on PC, but I understand that it was an important product that ended up proving that FPS can be done on consoles with dual analog aim assist. Hitting each other on the back of the head during coop was pretty awesome though.

But how is it lacking in pure objective terms? Just because you didn't like it as much as another game doesn't make one game better or worse than another.

as an avid FPS player on both PC and 360, hell even the wii! I can say halo is and always will be a great game! Nothing you or other people can take away from what it accomplished. I played I believe every game you listed except some of the newer ones and Halo is right up there with one of the most fun and most played for me. It felt the most balanced out of any FPS I have played. There is no weapon that someone can just dominate over me with that i can't find some counter for. I can't say that for a lot of games. And the mp maps i think were designed wonderfully and lead to great matches.

OP: I agree with you to some extent, genres that were predominantly PC before are now being slowly moved over to consoles and multiplatform games shared between PC and consoles are getting dumber and more watered down by the day.
Depth and gameplay are being discarded in favor of simplicity and cheap ass tricks and gimmicks like big budget hollywood movies with nothing but explosions to entice the masses.
I really don't like this development at all and can only hope it won't consume my all time favorite genre; RPG's, that will surely be the day I quit gaming.
Maybe I'm a dinosaur or "just don't get it" but I don't want all my games to become cheap, stylized borefests without challenge or content.

Well I guess thats just in your opinion then.  Cause Halo is the best series of games ever created imo.

Serious question - Have you ever played Half-Life 2?  (Single-player campaign)

Yes I have (check my gamerscore if you don't believe me--YO mUThEr)  And I have played both episode 1 and 2.  Haf-life 2 is amazing but it doesn't beat out Halo imo.

@max power: Which consoles do you own this generation, on an unrelated note?