One Bungied Over The Cuckoo's Nest

Dear Bungie,

I've been playing your game ODST. It's pretty good. I mean, it's Halo. Halo is a pretty good game. I enjoyed the trilogy, and this one seems like a pretty good side story. I like the atmosphere you've built, and the whole "audio drama" thing is pretty cool too. But I have a couple of problems. Now, no game is perfect, and only having a couple of problems is usually an OK thing. But these problems I have with the game are driving me insane. First off, take a look at this picture:
Do you see that? The blue button I'm pointing too? That's the 'X' button. That's the button I should be pressing to reload. That's sort of what we've come to expect from a FPS these days. In fact, you helped make that an expectation. In Halo 1 and 2, I was trained to hammer on that button obsessively when I could catch a free moment. But in Halo 3, you decided that you were going to shake up the genre or something by making that button activate equipment. That was a punk move, Bungie. The industry didn't follow. And then I decided to go back and play the first Halo before this new one came out. So I'd been pushing that X button a lot. Then your new game comes out, and what does X do? Activates the visor. I cannot tell you how annoying it is to try and reload my gun and get blinded instead. Couldn't you at least have made an option to remap the button to make it reload? That would have been cool. But no. You're just punks. Thanks, guys.

The second problem involves those audio dramas I mentioned. Those are cool little things you've included that break up the action and expand on the Halo world. It's reminiscent of "I Love Bees", and that's a good thing. Actually, that's probably what you were shooting for. Anyways, I love these things. What I don't love is when I'm trying to watch the illustrations you've included only to find out I've just been shot in the head. Why on Earth would you include the animations if you wanted to make us afraid to watch them?! Pause the game when you activate the map! I don't care if it "breaks the illusion" or whatever. Pause the game!

So yeah, those are my issues with ODST. Otherwise, it's a very good game. Although, are you ever going to make another game that doesn't have Halo in the title? I mean, you've gotten pretty good at making Halo games. I get that. But honest to God, do you even remember how to make different games anymore? Just curious.