I'm trying to create a top-down map in Unity2D, this map will act as an ocean that a 1 tile sized boat will drive across. I want to be able to generate this map programmatically by going through the grid to create shallow areas, spawn things, etc.
I've been reading it's not good practice to create game objects for each tile as there's so many. You can use object pooling but that sounds harder to manage. I've read that using a mesh map is the best way but no one follows up with the best way to implement it. Any clues to push me in the right direction?