here is a prototype for a tile engine i am working on, it doesn't use grid lists, but it instead uses a chunk system. there are 5000 objects in the level, but it only loads and renders roughly 200 at at a time. his is currently still a prototype, there is no level editor or saving / loading. it doesn't use any clones.
if you spawn in an object, press the green flag again. this currently only uses 256 blocks, so it's pretty simple. generating the level takes a while, but once we add the level editor this shouldn't be a problem. this is still a prototype, so there are a bunch of glitches.