Story wise, I used to consider myself someone who cared a lot about lore but I'm starting to lose interest. I didn't hate what happened in Halo 5 in terms of the series' story... I was just disappointed in how long it took to tell a very simple story. As has been my complaint in every instalment since Reach: it doesn't feel like much happens.

This is probably a result of the whole Locke chasing John, John chasing Cortana thing that consumes the whole plot. I found myself doing that old Simpsons bit: "when are they gonna get to the fireworks factory?!"

It's a game that could have been 3-5 levels spread out over ...what is it, 15? Cortana survived, interfaced with the Domain, has gone mad. Cool, so they've set up the story people may have been expecting since John plugged her into Installation 04, except 04 is now the Domain. Couldn't they have done more than just set that up? This really felt like a "filler" game between 4 and 6.

Anyway, the boring combat tied to a chase-the-character-through-varying-terrain plot made it feel like a joyless slog indeed.

I can't say I hated the game but that might just be my growing indifference to this franchise.