Halo 3, I have a gut feeling, will be like Halo 2, a mediocre continuation of the last game (a joke of a sequel) that everyone buys into. It will probably sell phenomenally and then everyone will talk about how dissapointed they were with it but by that time it will have sold over 6 million copies.

Ok now this is very exciting, cause apparently none of you noticed how much better the Beta looks compared to Halo 2 (I did). If the single player game is even better looking it will look amazing. Play the snow level in the Beta and just look at the moon in the sky, or how the snow reacts under your feet. Or check the level with the small river or pond I can't remember and look at the water (outside of Lair and Bioshock that's some of the best lookin' water in a game).

If by exciting you mean walking the razor's edge of whether a game will be awesome or mediocre.

I agree. In terms of offline play, the thing Halo1 got right was being a short game. It was over quickly and left you feeling like you wanted more. Halo2 was practically the same as Halo1, except longer. Sure, they let you play as the Arbiter, but he played about the same as Master Chief so it didn't feel any different. Because Halo2 was longer, it started to become a drag, and, by the end, there was no longer that taste left behind of wanting more. It was too much. Lost Planet is a better game than the Halo series. The boss battles in Lost Planet, except for the final one where you're more like playing Gundam, are awesome, even though Lost Planet's storyline sucks ass. Such boss battles are completely lacking in the Halos, which is why the Halos feel like you're playing one long, drawn out level for the entire game. In my opinion, Halo is way overrated, and that overzealousness by its fans may actually have been detrimental to the series' actually improving. Bungie mistakenly believes they had created the perfect game and are afraid to tamper with it when they're really still coming up short.

wait you're arguing the game is better if its shorter?

I'm arguing that Halo1 had the George Costanza effect: leave on a high note and keep them wanting more. Halo1 was brand new IP and pretty short, so it was able to have that effect despite having the same shortcomings Halo2 has (almost monotonous gameplay, not broken up by anything mindblowing like Lost Planet's boss encounters...when I ran into the grotesquely transformed captain near the end of Halo1, I thought I was finally getting to fight that big boss battle, but nope...). Halo2, on the other hand, was something we've already seen from Halo1 with the bland Arbiter thrown in and a few new enemies like the berserkers, and, most of all, it dragged and dragged. At the end, you feel like "finally..." and not "awww, damn..." The story was stupid too. Judging from their technology, the Covenant look like they should be the more advanced civilization, but they're still talking "prophets" and mistaking robot orbs as "oracles" as if they're still in the Stone Age, and that stupid peacemaking tentacled plant thing was just too random. Still, Lost Planet's story was even worse.

LOL the George Costanza effect...

Great reference, just great.

 So you wanted a bunch of Epic boss battles? I loved both Halo games. I didn't get all bent out of shape with the cliffhanger ending from the 2nd one either. If you notice when it's known there will be a sequel to something it always ends abruptly unless each part had diferrent stories. I think you people should relax and realize this is a beta. You are all judging it like it's the finished product, talking like you could do better.

The covernant are mostly primitive.  They gain most of their technology from the forerunners (hardly ever making their own) and they are basically a distatorship of many different species.  And whats the best way to hold together a bunch of different people and force them to do your will?  Tell them its for a religious cause...

in terms of halo:CE vs Halo 2... i felt that halo CE dragged more than Halo 2.  Halo 2 kept the levels less repetitive in my mind....  the gravemind wasn't "peacemaking" it was keeping itself alive.  The covernant wanted to activate the rings as divinge providence, but that would have destroyed all of the flood's food and thus wiped them out.  By using master chief and the arbitor the gravemind stayed alive. 

The flood devours information, if you read "the flood" then you'd see that when the infection forms take over a human/covenant they steal the thoughts and memories of the host and transfer it back to the gravemind.  This is why he says that he has listened for too long. 

I think the story is really cool... you just need to dig a little deeper to find what's really there.