To learn more about Destiny’s lore, you had to collect Grimoire Cards, then go on Bungie’s website or use the Destiny Companion App to read them. With Destiny 2, Bungie has left Grimoire Cards behind and the lore will be in the game.
Speaking with Forbes, Bungie World Lead Steve Cotton responded to the question of whether Grimoire Cards would be back in the upcoming sequel:
The answer to that question is no and the reason it’s no is because we want to put the lore in the game. We want people to be able to find the lore. All the story is told through the Adventures, it’s told through the characters in the world, it’s told through the campaign and it’s told through scannables you find throughout the world. In a separate interview with Glixel, Cotton talked about how they approached the social space in Destiny 2:
I don’t want to oversell how much civilization there is in all the different worlds, but absolutely, the Tower gets destroyed and you need a new place to call home for a little while. We also don’t want to divide the community up when they are in that home. When you go back to this place to do the things that you need to do ? whether it’s talk to people or decrypt things or just talk to the postmaster for whatever reason ? we want that to be in the same space that everybody else is going to be in. We don’t [want to] divide those up. We thought about it, but we don’t want to. We don’t really...