- If you find the camera controls uncomfortable, go to settings and try out the others. I like Hybrid best because the camera sticks to the character.

- I command you to get the free dlcs that are available, and I'd 100% recommend the Shadow Master and Ravenwood Stories dlcs. Character creation and skills are for some reason behind the Way of the Hunter dlc, which is free to purchase, as of writing this.

- There isn't a crazy amount of skills points to be gained in a playthrough, so focus to 2-3 skills from both trees. The fitness skill needs NO skill points, NONE, it will passively level the fastest, so fast it'd be halfway done by the end of base game.

- Explore every nook and cranny of a location, as there's usually something to be found where you least expect.

- In your discoveries section it shows if there's stories you've submitted, or are waiting to be submitted. To the right of that is a list of stash location hints. I overlooked the whole discovery/stash section, and missed out on stashes nearly the whole playthrough. Stash locations are randomly given whenever you loot a human corpse. The stashes won't spawn without the hint, so don't bother looking for them even if you know of a spot, and they also don't respawn.

- Just about every major trader that you can deliver orders to, will have a backpack upgrade for purchase that becomes progressively more expensive. The last couple of backpack upgrades will come from Jin in Ravenwood Valleys for 15k via a chat option, giving Razor back his armor (achievement if it's in perfect condition), and one is from the random loot of a stash.

- Completing Grigori's questline will give the option of converting 50 Reg. ammo to 50 AP ammo for 1k at a time. Not as cheap as buying discounted AP directly when possible. This is the only way I know of making AP ammo. The broken sniper rifle silencer can be found atop the last train cart on the tracks just before traveling to Oblenska. You have to start from the station platform and hug the fence all the way to the branch leading onto the cart. I also found a RPD with it.

- Giving 10 mutant hearts to the altar in the Ashinaka forest will turn off the teleporting, and Kirill's corpse has 9.

- Some armor, at least the flak armor, are not very durable, so if you get tired of routinely using up a hella lot of your field repair kit, or even the entire thing, then make regular trips to the mad mechanic and get good at loading it up with several items at a time (3-6).

- Delivering serum orders raises Rep with that trader and high quality serums raise it much faster. Max rep with a trader means you get access to more of their stock, great discounts, they have more Rubles available, and attachments, ammo, armor pieces, weapons, etc. that are unique to them.

- One of the best weapons in the game, the RPD lmg, requires 130% arm strength, so keep that in mind when creating your character, or just craft the serum that raises arm strength permanently. Arm strength also determines your melee damage, so eat those tall cans of food for increased arm strength and don't overlook the arm strength serum.

- Melee is a must for mutants, if you want higher quality parts, for higher quality serums, for better prices and rep gains. Tip for melee is to lead with a right-click since it comes out faster and will stun majority of mutants, then just stun-lock mutants while weaving in heavy left-attacks. Melee weapons have sharp/blunt damage, blunt is supposed to bypass whatever armor there is, and sharp weapons tend to cause bleeding (even if not listed), so they're more suited for unarmored mutants.

- The best melee weapons I think are either the Lucifer (sharp, from Grigori quest) and the entrenching shovel (blunt, in a nook behind some boxs at the house of the Mongol Horsemen's base), as both do 56 total damage, have the exact same stats, but their durability is different, sharp/blunt is flipped, and the Lucifer does severe bleeding. If I had to pick one, i'd pick the entrenching shovel because there's still the odd armored ghoul, and it can chop trees and plant crops. Carry along a crowbar always and you can open anything you come across.

- Stealth can always be a little finicky, so the area after the train-station has Filip of the Railroad Cossacks who sells a belt attachment to display the range where you'd be visible, which is better than guessing.

- The army cordon checkpoint pretty much requires stealth at that point in the game because you should only have access to crappy armor, shotgun and pistol. Maybe you can get lucky with the loot from a stash? Razor's training will give you the strangler that you need for stealth. Wait until 20:00 to head to the checkpoint, quick-save, go to the right of the bus, throw a rock, so the guard there faces away, a second rock to make him move toward it, and then strangle him (have to hold left-click until it's finished). Proceed to do the rock trick for the other wandering guard, and after that you can strangle the last 3 with no trouble.

- For the train station, you can stealth it, by activating the switch on the right side of the guard post beside the wall to turn off the light there (optional). Get to the left side of the entrance and toss a rock to get the two there to look away, so you can sneak through into the forested area on the left. Rock trick if you need to line up your strangle route. The guard in the booth of the train station doesn't seem to move, so save him for last when you go loud.

- In Lake Cheko, nearby the swamp village to the South East is a small camp with a corpse on a grave. There'll be a key to the motorcycle there. The motorcycle will first spawn at the starter village after reaching a certain gamestage pass the train station.

- Money making tips are to do your deliveries, crank out easy serums early on, check what the traders are "Demand"ing, keep stocked up on pure alcohol, tend to your farm once a week, harvest every herb and mutant part, and buy up the gas and scrap metal (A max rep trader will sell these for much less than standard) to maintain the motorcycle. It'd be more profitable to make and sell low quality serums than selling the ingredients you're overstocked with, but I think you make enough money as is with delivering high quality serums, and selling a haul of repaired weapons after a trip to the mad mechanic.

- You should fight every enemy human you find, so you can loot their weapons and take them to one of the mad mechanics (one at the gas station and another in the basement of the cottage at Lake Cheko). Wait for the mad mechanic's flame to simmer and dump several weapons or armor (3-6 at a time) to be repaired, just don't it one at a time. It's flames don't hurt you, so stand in it and monitor the durability percent of the highest one, as soon as one is repaired, pick it up and drop the next one. Use the detector to monitor the radiation levels and pop an anti-rad to counter the mad mechanic. The gas mask provides 5 or so rad resist, which should easily counter the mechanic with an anti-rad.

- Completing Haruko's quests will give a pot storage item for storing serum ingredients. The doctor in the tugboat will give a med box storage item for storing medical items (serums, bandages, vodka), upon delivering him 15 pieces of sh^it (check the outhouses and have a chuckle from picking up after your fellow man). These items are great for making the most of limited storage space, but they can easily overload you when filled to the brim, so offload the loot at your motorcycle or main base.

- Always carry around 3 vodka (room for those you pickup), 5 anti-rad, the gas mask, and anti-poison/radiation serums, 2 of each. When you've maxed Grigori's rep he will sell a helmet that provides both good protection, protect from gas, and 10 rad resist, which is 5 more than the first gasmask. This new helmet, plus an antirad can shrug off all but the worst radiation there is in the zone.

You can pretty much leave Tunguska whenever you want to finish the playthrough. But, one of the last objectives is to complete the experimental serum and give it to one of 3 or 4 (you didn't kill Artyom, right?) individuals who need it. It's up to you who you give it to, however, you can craft more of these, if you carefully read what Boris says the recipe is and infer that it needs a solvent. Here's the recipe, if you want everyone to have it; 1x incomplete serum (made up of 1x scythe's tendon, 1x motherwort leaves, 1x ginseng root, 1x spitter's vomit, and 1x gasoline @low heat) and 1x pyro's lung @low heat.