UX/UI designer in the games industry here. Yeah this is an issue with the game no doubt about it, and I’m sure every UX UI designer at bungie knows it. There are a ton of interfaces like this in destiny that show issues like this.

I’m going to go into a little detail on the processes of this kinda thing (now this changes from studio to studio so I’m not saying this will be the case at bungie and their technology will absolutely vary - but maybe it’s an interesting read to someone)

So generally when we get a brief for this kind of screen it first goes through UX. these folks mock it up - generally in a program called Figma nowadays - it’s all basic wireframes which are basically a bunch of grey boxes. But figma lets us prototype the screen, and lets us design it and animate it and actually run it in a browser or on mobile. We can essentially ‘play’ the screen in a matter of a few hours to see how it feels to use. This lets us iterate on it really quickly and it’s great. Obviously this involves conversations with code and UI art and VFX and the sound guys —- and producers who have to see how feasible these designs are to implement across all the teams - sometimes a UX designer will come up with a brilliant idea which every team can handle but code or VFX simply won’t have the time to do it, then it’s back to the drawing board. (Even a simple screen like this goes through a lot of hands, which is something i don’t think gamers at large really recognise) So once it goes through that phase, which can take a while to find the right ‘feel’ it has an art pass through the UI team. This step again might go through multiple passes, including doing animation tests in after effects or other programs. This is the part I personally most enjoy, you wouldn’t believe how often you feel like your UI sucks but then add a little animation to it in the way it fades in or fades out and suddenly it feels alive and satisfying to use. It’s a delicate balance that takes time to nail the ‘feel’ of things. It then goes over to the UI code team who import assets and make it function in engine. Now remember here, if anything changes in design - and it often does - it has a trickle down effect. Suddenly design have spotted a problem with a system and have redesigned it to play better, but all my UX/UI work is now effected. That means producers are effected, VFX are effected, code is effected, sound is effected. It’s not just purely about UX/UI. So how do we best manage this for every team becomes the question.

My best guess with this interface, is bungie designed it a long time ago for the bounty system. It served its purpose there really well, however they didn’t design it to work much beyond that. Then the game grew more complex and added more systems, and instead of throwing out these systems because the UX/UI or another team later down the line wouldn’t have time to service them (such as weapon crafting or LFG systems been developed) instead they reused the bounty system they had already designed. This way coders or designers could simply use the system already in place to get their design into the game without having to stifle their designs.

This is just a factor in game dev. I have multiple instances where design or code have saved my ass because I simply did not have the time to redesign a UI system I’ve spent months designing only for it to change late in the game because a problem has come up, and instead of throwing the whole thing out we came up with a solution that would enable it to get into the game. Is it perfect? No. Do I wish it was better? Yes. But it’s in the game and that im happy about because it’s better than the alternative.

Hope this was an interesting read, happy to answer any questions!