Halo 2, is not trying to be "arcade" shooter, its trying to be a well thought out, generaly "Fun" shooter. And Well yeah I have to admit that Halo 2's story was one hell of a dissapointment and I'm thinkin' Bungie mighta realised that by now. But yes, the story was short. Halo, however had an exelent story and the gameplay was exelent. Halos weapons where *slightly* unbalenced but the Halo 2 weapons are well balenced and fun to play. The two character's you can play with however arent quite that balenced, being that the head of the sparten Is quite a bit smaller than the Elite's head being much larger and eazy to hit.
And... Because your an idiot and dont realise this allready, Doom 3, and F.E.A.R. are supposed to be survival horror games, but F.E.A.R's more of a shooter i guess, but not better than Halo 2, and maby not worse. Quake 4, well I haven't played that yet and from what I've seen it's not exelent either. Call of Duty 2... Came out after Halo 2, so they where able to look at the faults of the game and seal them in with something new. It also doesn't have rag doll physics, which tends to be a plus in my book, still a great game. On to HL2... Well half life two has increadable game play, the best physics in ANY game so far, and has a great story, easily the biggist threat in the halo dominated world. Halo 2's story was... Coulda been better, but its real strength is in multiplayer. If you dont know this allready, people buy Xbox live, JUST so they can play halo with their freinds. And the lan partys are cool too, Although I've only been to one... Its easily the best part of halo 2.