No it's a deep story, but you might want to get Reach if you have the oppurtunity.

It's got more to it then COD, but nothing special. Like most FPS's you can pretty much play through the whole game not having the slightest clue what's going on.

Reading the story to the games online would be faster, and you'd probably remember a lot more.

Don't let anyone kid you and try to tell you Halo's story is shallow or anything like that.  Just look at the timeline, Halo's lore goes as far back as 100,00 B.C.E. and as far forward as 2610.

http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Timeline

I remember laughing with my brother as we blasted through the coop campaigns not knowing what the hell was going on story wise because Cortana kept telling us what was going in the middle of these loud and hectic firefights. Still a blast. Afterwords I kept saying " do you know what the hell is going on," and he woud laugh and say no. A great time no matter what.

You don't play Halo for the story, but its good for an FPS, though if you are getting it for the story ,then look elsewhere.

there is a difference between back story and the story in the game, its the same problem with Killzone and probably a lot of FPS's, lots of backstory but the story ingame is very straight forward.

http://killzone.com/kz/storyline.psml <--- thats the backstory of the killzone universe, sadly most of the stuff is barely mentioned in the games.

Someone needs to have balls to actually include a long and great story line IN game, surely no one brave enough to do it because FPS gamers arent like RPG gamers, why not make an FPS to be Mass Effect like? without being an RPG and without being single player?

have you even read the terminals in Halo 3

ODST you mean? , i don't remember Halo 3 much.

The terminals in Halo 3.

They tell a story from over 100,000 years ago about the end of civilization, the last stand of the dying Forerunners against the Gravemind of the Flood and a rampant AI who betrayed them named Mendicate Bias.  About the Humans being their Reclaimers and John 1117, Master Chief being the instrument of Mendicate Bias's redemption.

http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Halo_3_Terminals

Halo's story is simply incredible for those who decide to dig past the surface. 

oh those.. well i AM talking about backstories =s, the terminals weren't part of the storyline in game, you know like mass effect or the other RPGs? , RPGs like mass effect also did a great job for reading the Codex for you if you ever wanted to know about something you missed and such ,while it still can be explained to you while playing the game and talking to people and all, it made the storyline very enjoyable, thats the main reason why a lot of people don't like FPS games , because you don't feel involved in the storyline , you just shoot stuff and finish objectives, because the other guys are bad, and should die.