Causing mischief from the shadows
The thing is, Bungie are subtle story tellers, they aren't prone to loads of clumsy exposition that younger cinema goers have become acclimatized to.
Basically, modern day media does the work for the audience. Movies and games do the thinking for the audience so their brains don't have to do the work.
A modern narrative would have used some bulky exposition like "Hey, 6 it's a good thing you're wearing your re-entry pack, it'll help if you need to re-enter from space"
"yeah, I thought it was a good idea to bring a re-entry pack"
Later
"wow Spartan, how did you survive that fall from space? Hang on a minute, is that an M-type re-entry pack you're wearing? That would explain how you survived the fall from space"
Assassin's Creed is a perfect example that has to explain every single detail to you so your brain doesn't have to do the work. There's a part in that game where I facepalmed hard, Ezio says "Luckily that platform came loose, it will help me if I fall".
It's about subtlety. The Halo universe is full of detail and information for people to discover and it doesn't jump out and explain itself.