Various controller problems, and how to fix them

Starting Magicka 2 with Steam Link, using a Steam controller and an Xbox Controller for local co-op, I encountered various problems and bugs that cost me a lot of nerves. Here, I make a list of solutions in hope that someone finds them helpful.

Steam Controller cannot cast spells with LB switch.

Problem: This problem appears directly in the first scene of the tutorial. For example a healing spell by default is on "RB+Y". Pressing this didn't do anything when I first tried. Also, the HUD at the bottom showed it bound to the "Steam Button" instead of "RB+Y". It seems that the game shows "Steam Button" as a default when it encounters an error. See red player in screenshot below:



Solution 1: Turn off XBox Controller support, either globally as desribed in this post: https://imgur.com/gallery/QJZy6lQ Or only for Magicka, in the per-game controller settings set "Force Off". This might not fix the wrongly shown steam button in the HUD, but fix the problem anyway.

Solution 2: There are community configurations that fix this. Just browse configs and look for something like "FIXED official configuration" (credits to Anvie). This can also correct the HUD.

XBox Controller HUD shows Steam Controller bindings, not standard XBox one

Problem: A player with an Xbox controller might be shown the HUD of a Steam controller (red player in image).

Solution: This is a side effect of the Steam Overlay XBox Controller support. Just deactivate either globally or per-game, as described above in Solution 1.
The proper version then looks like this (green player in image):

Steam Controller irresponsive after cutscene

Problem: After every cutscene, the Steam Controller is stuck. You might still be able to walk, but not cast spells or use any other buttons. This is a tricky one, as I didn't find it by extensive googling. The reason is, that in the controller settings, there are two action layers: One for the menu etc. and one for in-game. During the cutscene, it seems like a menu opening is detected by error, and at the end of the cutscene, the return to game is not. The controller bindings are stuck in "menu action layer" and you can't do anything.

Solution: I added a new action to the unused LB button on the "menu action layer", binding it to an Escape button press on keyboard. In this way, the first time you cast a spell with LB modifier, the controller action layer will switch back to normal.


The working config can be found in community configs: "FIXED official configuration plus Escape", which I made from another user's "FIXED official configuration" (credits to Anvie).

TL, DR

Settings that work for me:

• To get Xbox controller native functionallity, deactivate "Xbox Controller Support" of Steam overlay.
  
• For Steam Controller, use "FIXED official config plus Escape", to get working HUD and escape from cutscreen hangup.

If everything works, it should look like this (Red=Steam Controller, Green = XBox controller):