X-Men Legends 2 expecting multitap

[OrangeTubes]

Hello, first post here ever so apologies if I break any etiquette.  I have been playing X-Men Legends 2: Rise of Apocalypse for a while and noticed that I somehow accidentally had it set so that I had the 'Multitap on Console Port 1' checkbox checked and had both controllers 1a and 1b mapped to my physical controller, which led to me accidentally playing co-op with myself a few times.  I disabled multitap so that this wouldn't happen anymore and somehow caused myself a much bigger problem.  Now when opening the game I get past the initial loading screen and am immediately (not even any developer cinematics) met with this screen:

   

"The dualshock2 analog controller is not detected.  Please insert a dualshock2 analog controller to controller port 1-A and press the x button to continue"

I don't get this issue in any other game I've loaded since then, and also still get the issue after trying loading the game with about every controller config I could try, even without memory cards, even remaking the iso.  Is it possible I've got something saved in the configs of PCSX2 itself that is causing the game to be stuck in this sort of state?

[refraction]

Are you loading the game with a savestate? because if you've removed the multitap since making the savestate, it's going to break it, you need to boot the game normally.

[OrangeTubes]

Are you loading the game with a savestate? because if you've removed the multitap since making the savestate, it's going to break it, you need to boot the game normally.

I may have initially done that, although I have since deleted all my savestates in the process of trying to troubleshoot what was going wrong.  I still get the same screen which I can't move past - even with multitap re-enabled.  Could breaking a savestate cause extra problems outside of the save state?

[jesalvein]

it can bust your memcard save, yes