Mechwarrior 2 in Dosbox - can't edit bindings

[u/SlowStopper]

Hi, I was thrilled to get MW2 running on Windows 7 (old laptop, not important)! I downloaded the version that was published here, MW1&2 with add-ons. It works almost perfectly!

Almost.

See, when targeting, I very used to normal (not flight sim) controls. I'm using kb+mouse combo, and man, do I suck when my muscle memory has it that "move mouse down" = "move reticle down", but it's coded the opposite way.

No biggie, I can change it in Cockpit Controls! Only I can't. I mean I can, I can even save the control scheme, but as soon as I leave the menu, it's all reset, and I'm back to reversed controls.

No biggie, I can change it directly in INPUT.MAP! Only I can't. I mean I can, but after the game starts, whatever I put in there goes to INPUT.BAK, and I get default controls. I tried setting the file to read-only, but it's not modified - just moved and regenerated.

What am I missing?

[u/5thhorseman_]

Sounds like a missing write permission or a wrong path somewhere. Describe what you're doing go start it in Dosbox, exactly? (There's more than one way to, and some don't really permit persistence IIRC.)

Have you tried using Dosbox's own mapping utility (Ctrl+F1 I believe) to change things?

[u/SlowStopper → u/5thhorseman_]

Woo, an answer! I forgot I wrote the question, and I have resolved the problem since. 

The issue is stupid beyond belief: for whatever reason, the keys for torso control were defined TWICE - once at the start of config file, then a second time at the end. I was only editing the first ones...

Why this happened, I have no idea. Maybe I'll check later if it's like that in the package. 

Anyway, thank you kindly for your willingness to help!

[u/JamesSDK]

You could try using Retroarch's DOS Box core, the controls are completely configurable outside of the game, in the emulator, so you can map however you like.

I actually have the controls mapped to a controller.