His hand was on the nuke and he lived. He clearly busted out the mods and hacked 343's programming to get out of there in one piece. Or Cortana did. Someone cheated or used an insane amount of space magic.

: Do you really need to know that though? I mean, I like detail as much as the
: next person, but does it matter HOW it fires in that instance? He's above
: Earth, no ship can stop him, so he can really just do any of the above and
: wipe Earth clean. I mean, we never knew the specifics of how Halo worked
: during Halo 1.

Do I really need to know how Batman got back to Gotham in the Dark Knight Rises? Or how he survived the explosion at the end? Not during the movie, where I was enjoying myself, or after right now where the answer "because he's Batman" is totally legitimate and the answer to any Bat-quandry. But after the movie, when I really start to think about the movie's plot and how absolutely terrible and ridiculous a lot of parts are, oh yes.

Or for a more direct answer, my main issue with it all is that there was never real impact felt because of the fact that we are so high above Earth and we have no idea about what's really happening (Truth was blasting into the ground and uncovering who knows what back in H3! Was it the fabled Ark, hidden away on Earth? A portal? A weapon that's going to doom us all? There's suspense, mystery, wonder). Did the Composer turn people to dust at the station, but when fired when combined with his ship turn into a planet destroyer? What's he doing? You're removed from all the action. What I'm saying is, the player is completely removed from it and the consequences aren't felt, especially with how easily we put a stop to it.

Stopping the Flood, and taking out that Halo, and escaping the ring was absolutely no easy task, and just got more and more intense as it went. The same occurs in H2 (even with all of its flaws), building up as Flood escape Delta Halo, civil war breaks out, Earth is invaded. Everything is going down. H4? Not much, no hurry, no urgency, no real true consequence. Quicktime event. You win! Well, Cortana didn't win, but she used space magic anyway so she got hit by the banhammer. Cheater.

: Huh. Going back and watching the cutscene, you really don't see the Ark
: destroyed. Hm. Well, personally I think it's destroyed. Would be cool to
: go back and explore it more though. As for the Flood, I know they can
: survive for a long time, but wouldn't they starve to death with no food
: available, no ships, and stuck outside the galactic rim?

I bugged Vociferous at HaloFest a few years back because the bit with the Ark was bugging me (and still is). I haven't believed for a second that we dealt with it or killed the Gravemind. For all we know, that fairly incomplete Halo ring couldn't even fire its life purging goodness. Vociferous did a brilliant job of not giving me a real answer, but he also acknowledged that things aren't necessarily as we might think in terms of things defeated/blown up/whatever. That's all the answer I need to know that something's still going on at that place, even if Gravemind is just trapped (for now).

And as for their starving, no. Look how long they've survived on the Halo rings. Or on Threshold's station. And apparently they're extragalactic in origin. I'm still more worried about the Flood or Precursors in a Halo game than I'd ever be about a silly vampire.

: Granted, when the Flood return (though I don't think it'll be the Flood from
: Halo 2/3 specifically), I expect a different Gravemind to be in charge.

Same. Or worse. Or the same one somehow able to communicate to whatever new problem we have to deal with. Dun dun dun!