Since both Xbox controllers and MSFS are relatively major Microsoft products, there should be more help on the forum on how to set up an Xbox controller specifically with one’s PC and the sim but I haven’t found a good summary here, so far. The idea of using the Xbox controller to control sim cameras, especially the drone camera is great.
I found two good articles, from PC Magazine: https://www.pcmag.com/how-to/how-to-use-an-xbox-one-controller-on-a-pc and on the Xbox site: https://support.xbox.com/help/hardware-network/controller/connect-xbox-wireless-controller-to-pc on how to connect a controller to one’s PC. Since I have an original Xbox One controller, which doesn’t have Bluetooth, I needed to hook up the controller to the PC with a Micro USB cable. For about $25, I can buy a Xbox Wireless Adapter for Windows 10 that would also allow me to use my Xbox headset (if I can find what I did with it!). Read some advice that if you don’t have one and want to get an Xbox controller for the sim, Wait!, as the Xbox Series X will soon be out and getting an Xbox Series X controller would be the best way to spend any money on a Xbox controller.
Once the controller is connected to the PC, you find in the sim that all the basic uses of the controller are already bound in the Options, Controls. There is quite a long list of controller button, trigger, and stick bindings depending in what view of the cockpit and the external environment that you’re in. It would be nice to have a comprehensive guide to all the different Xbox controls ALL IN ONE PLACE on the forum and going to the Options, Controls, to find something out while flying is pretty cumbersome.
In another post I’ve suggested that AI, besides giving advice, should be able to take simple questions and provide simple answers about how to use aircraft and camera controllers, e.g., “Cortana, show me the drone camera bindings for the Xbox controller.”
Maybe this is impractical. But there is already a floating camera applet window. When that Window is shown, there could be the same icons displayed to show the Xbox bindings that are in Options, Controls, for the controller (the control options shown in the Camera applet could depend on what controller you elected to use the cameras with). One could have further optional pop-outs within the camera applet to display deeper bindings like the two stick bindings, etc. Or the Controls screen applet could be smart enough to show another controller besides my flight stick and on the controller diagram in the Control applet label what button or trigger does what depending on what part of the sim, cockpit, cockpit camera, drone camera, etc., one is in.
Maybe deeper more sophisticated help would cut into the sim fps. But it could be a sort of optional training wheels you don’t invoke when you don’t need it any more. And maybe one could set all one’s graphics settings very low and go to a barren part of the sim world or a barren artificial world to get maximum fps while still using maximum AI training help in learning to use cameras or training in the use of cockpit controls, etc., with whatever your controller is. If developers had the option in the sim to add in sophisticated in-sim help for learning how to user a controller, that might start an arms race amongst flight sim controllers companies as to whose controller had the best built-in sim and AI help for the use of their controller.
Much of this is pie-in-the-sky. It would still be nice to have everything in one place for the setup and use of Xbox controllers within MSFS and not have to hunt high and low on the forum and around the Internet on how to setup and use an “old” original Xbox One game controller with MSFS. Sorry I’m such a clueless newbie (always a thrill to discover what the AI censor wants to zap - is “clueless” on the hit list?).