Welp, Brink and CE Remake have already failed, all that's left is for Nexuiz, Warsoup and Tribes to not come through and the console FPS genre will be dead.
I just really really want Halo 4 to return to a more arena style multiplayer experience. The issue is that players who aren't competitive may not like the style of purely arena maps. So for a developer its finding a balance between Arena Symmetrical and Asymmetrical maps and larger less competitive maps. The addition of MLG playlist was just a small step towards the competitive scene being taken into account, but if they can try and cater to both parties, the casual and Competitive, I think H4 has a lot of potential. Being run by a studio not dominated by a Big Brother in Microsoft also helps.
Maps are just one of several problems though.
Halo 2 had great maps, but if it weren't for glitches, it would have been an awful game. Sprint would have been a great mechanic in Reach if they knew how to properly balance it with gun damage and such. Same goes with bloom and how poorly it was implemented. The list goes on and on; Bungie (and now 343) have no idea how to properly make and balance a game that serves any other purpose other than making money.
And I may be reading your last sentence wrong, but 343 is a Microsoft studio.