The Planless Beginning
At first, I thought FPV was just buying a drone and flying.
Simple, right?
Then I realized: goggles, radios, simulators, Betaflight... it’s a whole universe.
And without any plan, I jumped right in.
My starting point?
An old Xbox 360 controller that had been collecting dust in a drawer for years.
No FPV radio, no goggles, no experience. Just curiosity.
July 7 – The First Flight That Didn’t Happen
On July 7 2025, I bought the Uncrashed FPV Simulator on Steam.
Finally, I thought — now I can learn to fly.
The first few minutes were both overwhelming and disappointing.
The controls felt impossible.
The drone didn’t do what I expected, every move felt random, and within minutes I was close to giving up.
I remember thinking:
“If this is what FPV feels like… maybe it’s not for me.”
But instead of uninstalling, I decided to try one more thing.
July 8 – DRL Simulator
The next day, on July 8 2025, I downloaded the DRL Simulator.
Honestly — I started it with fear.
I didn’t want to be disappointed again.
But this time, something clicked.
Within minutes, the drone lifted off, hovered, and actually responded.
I couldn’t believe it — it was possible to fly
The Missing Piece
Weeks later, I finally understood what went wrong.
The Xbox controller automatically centers its sticks when released.
For normal games, that’s perfect.
But for FPV, that’s a problem — because one of those sticks controls the throttle.
In FPV, throttle is not centered.
Real FPV radios have a throttle that stays where you leave it.
So in Uncrashed, every time I let go, the controller snapped back to 50 % throttle —
and the drone instantly shot up like a rocket.
No wonder it felt uncontrollable.
DRL Simulator, on the other hand, handled the Xbox controller differently.
There, the center position equals 0 % throttle —
which made my first flights so much easier to understand.
Lessons Learned
Uncrashed isn’t the “worse” simulator — not at all.
It just wasn’t right for a complete beginner using an Xbox controller.
Today, I know both have their strengths:
🎮 DRL Simulator – Great for beginners using gamepads.
🧠 Uncrashed – More realistic physics and flight behavior once you use a proper FPV radio.
Looking back, DRL Simulator was the step that kept me from quitting.
It gave me that first spark of control, that first feeling of “Okay, I can actually do this.”
What This Taught Me
FPV isn’t about instant success.
It’s about learning to fail, understanding why something doesn’t work, and adjusting.
That lesson started on July 8 — and it’s the reason I’m still flying today.
