Warzone had my interest peaked, but the campaign reveal was pretty disapointing to me.

Halo 4 really ushered in a much more linear Halo, , one that lost some of that kind of freewheeling simulation and open combat. This demo really focused on those elements. In that respect it's kind of disappointing.

Other stuff looked good, though, the guns looked solid, and the command infrastructure has some potential. But I'm still skeptical. I dunno, maybe they can take that command stuff and expand it enough to give Guardian's it's own identity, or maybe it will go more and more scripted like other FPS.

Not to harp on the Tim Longo connection too much, but part of what made Republic Commando so much fun was the breadth of the levels, and the amount of improvisation they allowed. Plenty of room to use the squad commands in fun and creative ways. I'm hoping Halo 5 will follow suit. If not, it could all fall flat.

Totally fair. Watching E3 is a bit like trying to read the oracles of delphi. "What did they focus on for this trailer, and why did they focus on that thing?" "Is that indicitive, or is it just for the show?"

FWIW that fun open combat that Halo is known for also *shows* incredibly poorly. Pretty much Every Halo since 2 (and honestly, most of CE's E3 showings stunk) has looked pretty bad on stage.

I was comparing H5 to Halo CE-Reach all of which but one were Linear in structure but provided open ended combat

You might describe it as the baggy pipe. A level in Halo is like a pipe, but you occasionally hit these sections where you get some freedom. The combat opens up, and you have some more solutions to the problem. Contrast to most FPS, where the solution space is pretty limited. "Do I use cover or cover B?" and generally it's about reaction time. COD campaigns generally combine a lot of this style of action with huge setpieces, but at their best they break it up (COD2 and MW did a great job of it). Halo did it a lot; wide open Beach assaults, to the AI driven Scarabs, Tsavo highway and the ability to steal tanks or blow them up or the canyons in AOTCR. But it wasn't just the big sections too. Even in the intimate fights the game gave you multiple paths, and the ability to improvise. The stealth lite sections or the 3 way battles.

Halo 4 instead focussed on fewer of these moments. There was lots of bombast, and crazy moments, fewer open spaces and battles that unfolded. This trailer really focussed on the linear, setpiece driven nature, which was disapointing.

Destiny in some ways has the opposite problem. Destinies situations can go really wide open (especially something like the POE), given the huge variety of builds, combinations, and synergies. But it lacks clear setpieces and bombast.

You do realize Destiny is an incredibly linear game outside of patrol? Each planet is basically a giant 'level select' menu for you to find your walled-in corridor so you can finish the story mission.

I have hope there will be plenty of diversity in Halo5 mission with how we approach a mission objective with squad commands, the 'Artemis' actions Fireteam Osiris can use and more nimble spartans with the expansion of their abilities and verticality. I don't see how Halo5 should be any more linear than Destiny already is.

If you can take them at their word, it'll be more open. They said in the recent Game Informer article (it's free) that they have multiple paths and ways to complete objectives as part of the level design, and this Artemis thing can show you some of them (and only Fireteam Osiris gets the Artemis thing).