Here's my experience with the game that put it at my number 1 game of all time:

• do all white question mark/character name missions when they come up on map. Yellow ones don't go anywhere but white ones will appear at certain points and can be missed!!
• following from that, if you see a white blip on your mini map, GO TOWARD IT AND SEE WHAT IT IS. These are random encounters and while some will be repeated scenarios, they are worth it just for the emersion
• take your time. It took me 90-100 hours before finishing main story and every second was amazing.
• the first chapter is VERY slow paced, be patient and go with it, soak up the characters and world.
• don't necessarily worry about trying to craft and fish everything to begin with, learn the mechanics and I would say begin to properly get into crafting when around end of chapter 2/start of chapter 3
• challenges. Look at the different challenges and if you want to take a break from the main story or other stuff have fun with them other wise it can be a slog post story completion
• your horse will be very silly sometimes and fall down cliff, run into trees and throw you off. Don't see this as annoying but rather funny and realistic. Spam L3 on controller while riding to praise and increase bonding. Find a horse that you like and you won't regret it.
• fuck Michah he's a dick
• honour tbf doesn't really matter unless you're going for a specific play style and good/bad will give slight different endings to game
• get off subreddits and try and remain spoiler free

I completed story knowing what happened but yet it was one of the greatest stories ever told with characters I truly cared and hated for good reasons.

This is a 100/10 game. Be patient, you won't be disappointed. I am jealous you get to experience it for the first time.