You can remove those tiles also.
If you notice that arrow at the bottom left of the tiles and click on it, it will take you to the complete list of programs, if you unpin a tile from start, it moves to that list and you can replace it anytime you want.
The only tiles I have showing, are what amount to my desktop icons, I keep my desktop bare, and click on the tiles if I need to open a program.
Do you boot directly to desktop?
The METRO Squares Spamming would not mean much to most but to those on dial up {still the only connect means available for some of us} it uses up needed download speed. I've had the computer a week and a half and been on line about four days. I'm still working my way through trying to make it useable and somewhat recognizable. Increased Clock Font size would be real great also.
I'm having to take a lot of extra steps to do what was simple on XP. BTW yes I have Classic Shell installed now also. That helped matters a great deal too. The ability to put on what XP was called Quick Launch is gone. Some things will Pin there some wont. For an Email program I'm using eMail Client free version. With W-8 default mail program you do not get an Icon Prompt for incoming mail. eMail Client download from Downloads.com has an Icon notification. W8 is missing a lot useful long standing functions IMO.