My design for the map: A 64x64 grid of tiles, each represented by 32x32 pixel tiles that are all sprites. The map data will be held in a 2D array, and there will be a function that runs whenever something changes that will update the sprite-tiles to reflect the data in the array. The player's view window of the map will be only 10-15 tiles in size and will follow the player, generally, wherever they go on a particular map.
When the player goes from one 64x64 map area to another, the array will be filled with the new data, and the tiles will be updated.
Now that you (hopefully) have an idea of how this is supposed to work, I am wondering if there is an easier way to place each of those tile sprites (all 64x64=4096 of them) in the editor? Or will I have to script it in runtime to set the grid up?
Also, do you think having 4096 relatively inactive sprites will run slow or cause other problems? Any suggestions for a better method of having dynamic tiles?