The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom

  • The tutorial area may seem open-ended, but you may have a much harder time and have to backtrack if you don't follow the path.
  • You should follow the main story quest a bit after leaving the tutorial zone - until you do, you won't get your glider or activate the towers.
  • Follow Josha's quest line after getting the paraglider as it will quickly unlock the camera which is needed for other quests.
  • It's probably also a good idea to head in the direction every NPC hints at for your first major journey as you'll stumble across a fairly important main quest on the way.
  • Every cave has a glowing creature you can defeat that will drop a collectible gem - when you do, a checkmark will appear on the cave's icon on the map.
  • Jump in every well you see.
  • If something in the world seems incomplete in some way, you can probably complete it for a Korok seed.
  • Save your Diamonds. Also some of the other gem types (flint and amber) are required in the hundreds to upgrade certain basic armours.
  • Increasing max Hearts is much more important than it was in Breath of the Wild, partially because having reduced max hearts from Gloom damage disables the usual one-shot protection for being at full health.
  • If you find a good source of Sundelions (which make meals that remove said reduction), mark it on your map, and make a habit of picking up a few more every time there's a Blood Moon.
  • You may still want to get a full second Stamina wheel before too long, though, for reasons that will become apparent in time.
  • Don't be afraid to just Roast food ingredients you have a lot of, especially ones with no special meal effects, or ones you don't really care about (i.e. Apples, Silent Shrooms). Roasted food stacks, but meals don't.
  • Don't underestimate the usefulness of being able to attach monster parts to arrows. For example, Keese Eyes add a homing effect, which can be very useful against evasive flying enemies. They may also home in on weak points, depending on the monster and your firing angle.
  • There's an NPC in Tarrey Town who can detach items from weapons without destroying them.
  • You can and should find the shirt that increases climb speed in a seemingly-generic cave near the North Hyrule Plains stable, behind the waterfall.
  • When you go to Zora's domain and want to start the main quest there, it's a good idea to go and talk to the prince's fiancé first. It's a short quest and it'll make the rest much easier.
  • While using Ultrahand you can press ZL to reset the object's rotation, at least it says reset but it really just tries to lay it flat, it's still handy for certain things and it's easy to miss this.
  • Don't write off rewind as a niche puzzle ability, it's every bit a part of your open world toolkit as the other abilities and should be experimented with. It'll make objects re-trace whatever path they took though the air, even if they're no longer connected to anything, and the range is surprisingly long so it can be used for recovering stuff that falls down a hill even if it's mundane things like monster parts.
  • Don't sleep too long on unlocking the great fairy pod once you run into one the first time. Most armor you find will have a similarly low defense rating value and even the cheap first level upgrades will roughly double it. Once you unlock the first one, they'll be marked on the map and you can work on the rest whenever you want.
  • The stamina cost for shooting an arrow while in the air is per shot now rather than being consumed over time. Take time to aim and don't spam shots.
  • When you find a new decayed weapon, use it until it breaks. It's not crucial but may save you a lot of frustration later.
  • The cooking system is very flexible so feel free to experiment. Just note that you can't add more than one special effect, and if you want to use critters (insects, lizards and frogs) you must also use a monster part to make it into an elixir, as using only one of those will produce dubious food.
  • Hearty ingredients restore all your health and add temporary yellow hearts when cooked. It's probably best to cook them one at a time, as having multiple full recoveries is way more useful than using multiple hearty ingredients to increase the yellow hearts you get in a single meal.
  • Selling cooking products is one of the best ways to make money.
  • Also, you get so many brightbloom seeds, so don't be afraid to sell them. You probably won't need more than a 100 in your inventory, even for armor upgrades.