Okay Guys and Gals - after some head scratching, I got joysticks working under Masterroids 1.1.
Again it is not obvious how to do it.
With Xevents running for the joystick I'm testing, I ran Masterroids - a box is present at start-up asking you to center the joystick and then press enter (can be done from either a mouse or hitting ENTER on the keyboard.
Follow the instructions when the calibration graphic window opens - move the joystick around in a circle a couple of times then click the big Checkmark button.
Before starting the game you must go to the Options dropdown, and then click on Player (very obvious, right? - N-O-T)
A window will open which allows you to customize the keyboard control settings, for each of up to 4 players. However, there is also a checkbox marked "Joystick" which must be checked as well. Press the big Checkmark button at the bottom to go back to the starting screens.
To run the game, go to the Games dropdown - choose 1 player, then enter, to start the game.
Without checking that one Joystick checkbox, the game will not recognize that a Joystick is there, despite asking you to calibrate same .......... a fine example of the first corollary to Murphy's Law - namely Murphy was an optimist ............
And, oh, by the way, this has to be done each time the game is run - despite the ability to register the game is long in the past, the unregistered version will not save any changes to PLAYER or SETTINGS options from game to game, as opposed to settings under CONFIGURATION, also in the Options dropdown.
But we have yet another native OS game that can be tested, kids - and from the limited time spent on it this evening, a game that is a lot of fun, bringing me back to the money dropping hours I spent in the video arcades about a century ago .......... !
Time for bed and Best!
M