While I am happy that it was changed from having every object labeled as "Object", the truth is the current change has caused some problems. Now because the object name is shown in-game, we have to name objects what they will be displayed as.

Unfortunately, this can make editor work much more difficult. For example, in Dereliction Duty, I have multiple freighters that I want displayed as Derelict Human Freighter, but when I do that it's impossible to tell them apart in the editor. Before I could name them whatever I wanted, so I knew what they were. With more complex missions it can be difficult enough connecting the right objects to interacts without having them all named the same thing!

This problem exists with contacts now too because their extra field was removed, leaving only a single name field, just like with objects.

What we really need is to go back to the previous contact setup, where they had a name in the editor and a separate entry for what we wanted them named in the game. If left blank this could revert to "Contact" (instead of the stupid UGC Contact previously listed) and with objects it would list as "Object" just as before.

Completely agree. It can be quite frustrating when you have multiple triggers going off multiple instances of the same object that you want to have the same name, and you can't differentiate between the objects on the list.

So it would be good to have an internal name that stays as Nebula Cloud 01 #1, Nebula Cloud 01 #2, etc, and a separate one visible to the player.

In the mean-time, i'd say just make sure you do the object names last of all after all triggers are in place.

I'd also like to mention that individual NPC Group actors are difficult to differentiate. Now whenever I want to select an individual actor (for example the Captain npc) I have to give all of them numbers and preview the mission to figure out who is who.