Since the system update yesterday on 2025/09/19, my Xbox Series X Controller stopped being detected in Genshin Impact. The controller is connected through USB. The game is launched from Steam (as a non-Steam game). Both my system and Steam detect the controller correctly, but not the game. I have not tested with other games yet.
After a bit of searching, i found the permissions of /dev/uinput have changed following the update: the g=rw permissions have been removed. I tried setting those again, but that were not enough to make the controller detected again.
Installing xboxdrv and enabling its service makes the controller detected again by the game.
I haven’t found any related upstream issue, though i don’t know where to look at, nor which package is concerned. Can you please help me do so?
Anway, according to this, you may want to try xone-dkms. Other than that, I can’t really provide further insights. As I’m not familiar with Genshin Impact and don’t have this type of controller.
Same symptoms with my 8bitdo Pro2, Pro3 and ZD-O+ Excellence in Steam with both Hollow Knight and Celeste after updating. It doesn’t seem to matter if they’re in x-input mode or d-input mode. KDE and steam both recognize them, but games don’t.
I also noticed that I had to create a UDEV rule for my logitech unifying receiver for solaar to show the device. Going back to the LTS kernel didn’t fix it, so I think something else must have changed.
It’s really sounding like the new systemd update is causing some weird stuff with controllers:
Couple bug reports on steam-for-linux github where people are talking about systemd 285-2 giving issues.
Not sure if it’s worth holding it back, I also noticed some weird additional 1-2 second lag when decrypting, though unsure if systemd related as I’ve not ran the update again after rolling back when I noticed some weirdness on boot.
NB: I did a few more tests, and i reproduce both the issue and the workaround with some other games through Steam, namely Human Fall Flat (Windows version) and Valheim.
Are that things which probably are fixed sooner than later?
I mean currently for games that have native controller support I can just “disable steam input“ and it works then…
But I would like to know if I should try some workarounds like mentioned with “chmod 666 /dev/uinput” or better wait (as I am sure I would 100% forget to revert it back later )
I’m apprehensive usually to hold back updates because of a partial upgrade scenario, but I’ve held back all systemd related packages for now.
Did a system upgrade and still running with no breakages.
Please if you do hold back and do partial upgrades make sure your backups work beforehand (you should ALWAYS be testing backups anyway otherwise you never know if they work until they don’t, please practice good backup logic and handling) AND THAT YOU KNOW HOW TO RESTORE THEM FROM A LIVE USB! You also probably won’t be able to get support anymore from anywhere on a partially updated system so please keep that in mind as well!
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