I respected Reach from the perspective of game developers actually developing the game with each sequel.
Halo -> Halo 2: added online multiplayer, dual weilding and hijacking
Halo 2 -> Halo 3: added forge mode, community sharing service, and deployables
Halo 3 -> Reach: Complete rehaul of core game mode (which was kinda shit tbh) and put forge mode on steriods
I respected the shit out of Bungie for having actual new ideas to bring to the table with each game, justifying it being an actual sequel. Rather than CoD which often times was just a reskin from game to game.