Merchwarrior 5: Mercenaries (784080)

Compatibility Report

• Name of the game with compatibility issues: MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries
• Steam AppID of the game: 784080

System Information

• GPU: RX 570 (4gb)
• Driver/LLVM version: 4.6 Mesa 22.0.3
• Kernel version: 5.17.5-300.fc36.x86_64
• Link to full system information report as Gist
• Proton version: Proton Experimental 7.0-20220518b (build 1652970829)

I confirm:

• that I haven't found an existing compatibility report for this game.
• that I have checked whether there are updates for my system available.

«I'll add proton logs when required, this is a DirectInput/SteamInput issue)

Symptoms

Whenever I move the joystick (Logitech x52 Pro) it "sticks" to the side I moved it. Tried several community guides with remapping settings to no avail. The developer states that this model is officially supported and should work out of the box.

Reproduction

With a Logitech x52 pro HOTAS device, launch the game and into any content that gives you full control of your mech (not tutorial!)
Barely move the stick to any direction and let go, joystick recenters but in game it's as if I'm holding the stick 100% to one axis. Only happens with the joystick axes (X Y Z) and not the throttle.
Here's a video showing the issue and how to reproduce it.

Further testing

• Switched to different versions of proton, both official and unofficial (7.0-2, 6.3-8 and GE builds) deleting the corresponding compatdata folder between tests.
• Made sure to have Steam-Devices (udev rules) installed.
• Via protontricks (using the game's prefix) verified the correct behaviour of the axes and buttons on Wine's Joystick applet on Wine Control Panel
• Followed the Official joystick configuration documentation here
• Tried two different HOTAS remap config files offered by the community, linked by an official forum's post and Steam's community tab

Start by reproducing the Logitech X52 Pro joystick-axis behavior in MechWarrior 5: Mercenaries (Steam AppID 784080) using the Proton versions listed in the report, then review the linked video and the generated $HOME/steam-784080.log if available. Done means the X, Y, and Z axes recenter correctly in game rather than remaining at full input.