A realistic review from someone who's played every Halo game, but isn't a Halo fan
That being said, I loved the first Halo. It was a brilliant game with an enigmatic main character with a serious issue with the voice in his head (Cortana), and did a great number of things that had never been seen in gaming before. Halo 2 (or as I call it, the Halo update), merely phoned in a game that insisted we love it because its predecessor was so great. Halo 3 was a good game, but didn't really make any improvements. I am not even going to mention ODST, because it was just a sick practical joke to milk more money out of the series.
But now on to Reach.
I decided to get this game on release day because I hadn't played any new games and I finally got Xbox live again. I'm not a big FPS fan to begin with (RPG's are my thing), and I was looking for a game to tide me over until New Vegas comes out. I can honestly say Reach was more than I bargained for. More than a mere distraction, it forced me to rethink my stance on the entire series (which I have started to replay from the beginning).
The campaign is good but not great. It's about what you'd expect. Epic in many ways, plodding in others. What it sets out to do, it does well. The characters are a bit two-dimensional, and we never really get the impression that they're the Spartan badasses that the other Halo games made Master Chief out to be. Essentially, it's another space marine shooter. That's not a bad thing, because it's a pretty good campaign. The graphics are great on 1080p (the first Halo game in HD), and the audio is great in 5.1 surround. The campaign is short, so I wouldn't buy the game unless you've got a lot of dorm buddies to play local multiplayer. Get a LAN party going with the room next door and you'll have a blast, but for those of you with no friends (like me), I'd recommend you invest in Xbox Live for this package.
The weapons are pretty much what you'd expect. Odd that a prequel to the whole series has better weapons than any other game (I hated the battle rifle since its inception. The DMR is awesome). In any case, the weapons feel well balanced. The pistol is back in the same condition as the first game, so you always have a sniping sidearm, which is cool I guess.
The multiplayer is what 90% of people play Halo for, so let's talk about that. The game has only a few maps at the moment (not counting the thousands of maps already made by players in Forge), but more are likely to be released. The game lobby system is a breeze, letting you stick to a segment of game types and their related variants. When you start a match, three random choices appear, 3 random gametypes, random maps, and random add-ons. So it's true that you can be wanting to play Slayer and wind up in a DMR SWAT match, but it adds variety and lets you get accustomed to other game types. Some of them are really boring though. I hate Safe Haven and some of the other game variants I've never played before, and once the voting starts, you can't leave the matchmaking unless you exit to the dashboard.
Probably the best thing about the online matchmaking is the psych profile. One of the reasons I hate Xbox Live is the damn kids. I HATE kids on Xbox Live. I wish there was a setting to not play with players who have voices above a certain Hertz level (high pitched voices), but Halo found an interesting way to set who you want to play with. I'm set to "polite, quiet, and I play just for fun." I'm not interested in playing with egomaniacs who rub it in your face with every kill, or little kids who don't shut the hell up, so it's nice to have the option to screen that BS out.
All in all, this game is pretty awesome and I highly recommend it. I don't think it's perfect, but it's the best in the series so far. The campaign is competent, even if it's short. The multiplayer is a blast, and the varied game types keep things interesting and prevents it from getting stale. If you're not a Halo fan, I still recommend you try it. I'm not a big Halo fan, and this is quickly becoming one of my favorite games.