I've the same issue on ubuntu 11.04 with gnome2/metacity (without compiz) it affects also looking up/down.

The same on mageia 3 with kde.

Same story on completely up-to-date arch with KDE, ati HD 4770 GPU and razer diamondback mouse.

Same thing, but I'm running LXDE on linux mint 11.

I can confirm it on Debian Wheezy running KDE 4.9 with an Intel HD3000 (Sandy Bridge Core i5)
All in all I don't think its a window manager thing as it is running fine on Ubuntu 12.10 even with icewm.
It may be the X-Server but as 12.04 ships with 1.11 and it seems to work there it must be something else. (or ubuntu really has nasty x-server patches of that I am not aware)
I will try somehow to install this X-Server from Ubuntu to see if it really is one of those patches.

Also confirming this on Debian Wheezy 32bit with Xfce 4.8 on a Intel 915GV chipset (Pentium 4 519J).

Ok small update. I installed xserver-xorg-core 2:1.12.4-4 from debian Testing and either that or the small update to counter-strike and half-life made it work here. So no need to install the x-server from Ubuntu to get it running.

For sure it's not an half life update which did it. The issue is still present on X.Org X Server 1.10.1

Unfortunately there are no packages to update it so it could be troublesome on this system (gnome 2 xorg 1.10.1 ubuntu 11.04, metacity with no compiz) - could have a look anyway at what can be done - , on the debian testing system ( x.org 1.12.4 xfce) the problem doesn't show and the mouse is correctly captured (and invisible) (both have the same version of nvidia drivers 310.18).
Steam runtime being enabled or not makes no difference it seems.

to add my experience of this bug, with mageia2 and x11-server 1.11.4 i was unable to turn further when the visible cursor hit the edge of the screen, but i downloaded src rpms for the mageia3 beta and compiled x11-server 1.13.2 (plus dependencies of course) and now, no visible cursor, and 360 degree movement! my video card driver is nvidia 304.64 on a geforce 7800gs.

cl_mousegrab 0 don't work, the mouse is kept in center of screen, but I can't move

Same the mouse is repositioned in the center of the screen each second i can move the view but it's like if it was reset each second like the mouse (so i cold move the view a bit but then it's put back in the original direction)

I can also confirm this issue.
Processor Information:
Vendor: AuthenticAMD
Speed: 2100 Mhz
2 logical processors
2 physical processors
HyperThreading: Unsupported
FCMOV: Supported
SSE2: Supported
SSE3: Supported
SSSE3: Supported
SSE4a: Supported
SSE41: Unsupported
SSE42: Unsupported

Network Information:
Network Speed:

Operating System Version:
Linux (64 bit)
Kernel Name: Linux
Kernel Version: 3.7.5-1-ARCH
X Server vendor: The X.Org Foundation
X Server release: 11104000

Video Card:
Driver: ATI Technologies Inc. ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4200 Series

Driver Version:  1.4 (2.1 (3.3.11672 Compatibility Profile Context))
Desktop Color Depth: 24 bits per pixel
Monitor Refresh Rate: 59 Hz
VendorID:  0x1002
DeviceID:  0x9712
Number of Monitors:  1
Number of Logical Video Cards:  1
Primary Display Resolution:  1366 x 768
Desktop Resolution: 1366 x 768
Primary Display Size: 13.54" x 7.64"  (15.51" diag)
                                        34.4cm x 19.4cm  (39.4cm diag)
Primary VRAM Not Detected

Sound card:
Audio device: IDT 92HD88B1

Memory:
RAM: 5719 Mb

Miscellaneous:
UI Language: English
LANG: en_US.UTF-8
Microphone: Not set
Total Hard Disk Space Available: 37049 Mb
Largest Free Hard Disk Block: 13597 Mb

Installed software:

Recent Failure Reports:
Sat Feb 9 15:10:15 2013 GMT: file ''/tmp/dumps/assert_20130209171012_1.dmp'', upload yes: ''CrashID=bp-65692ecb-5d20-4e1c-9f82-a96ca2130209''
Sat Feb 9 15:15:52 2013 GMT: file ''/tmp/dumps/assert_20130209171550_1.dmp'', upload yes: ''CrashID=bp-4517af85-cc41-4b2a-a9eb-feb4e2130209''

With Xorg-server>= 1.13 and Open Ati drivers everything was good

I have the same problem.
Mageia 2 + E17 / Mageia 2 + LXDE

the same in mageia 2 with kde 4

Debian, had same problem. Update xorg packages to 1.12 solve that problem for me.

Driver: NVIDIA 304.64
Debian GNU/Linux unstable (sid) (32 bit)
kernel: 2.6.38-2-686
version X Server: 11204000

Got the new AMD ATI driver 13.1 [8.97.100.7-1] legacy via Debian : http://packages.debian.org/experimental/fglrx-legacy-driver
Haven't updated X. It's still 1.11

And the cursor is gone!
I finally can play nicely!

Wohoo!

I'm having the same problem on Fedora 16/64 w/ nvidia gfx/drivers. I have all the latest updates and there is nothing I can presently use in the testing repos.

Anyone find a work-around for this? Once things start to get a little tough, the game is virtually unplayable like this.

i wondered if this had anything to do with mouse acceleration, since the mouse pointer moves faster than the cross hairs. I tried a few things including -noforcemaccel and -noforcemspd (in addition to cl_mousegrab 0) but no joy.

FWIW, Amnesia: Dark Descent does not have this mouse pointer issue so I wonder if this really is an xorg problem?

Here's my config ala steam:

Processor Information:
Vendor: AuthenticAMD
Speed: 2200 Mhz
2 logical processors
2 physical processors
HyperThreading: Unsupported
FCMOV: Supported
SSE2: Supported
SSE3: Supported
SSSE3: Supported
SSE4a: Unsupported
SSE41: Unsupported
SSE42: Unsupported

Network Information:
Network Speed:

Operating System Version:
"Fedora release 16 (Verne)" (64 bit)
Kernel Name: Linux
Kernel Version: 3.6.11-4.fc16.x86_64
X Server Vendor: Fedora Project
X Server Release: 11104000
X Window Manager: Xfwm4
Steam Runtime Version:

Video Card:
Driver: NVIDIA Corporation GeForce 8400GS/PCIe/SSE2

Driver Version:  3.3.0 NVIDIA 304.64
Desktop Color Depth: 24 bits per pixel
Monitor Refresh Rate: 60 Hz
VendorID:  0x10de
DeviceID:  0x10c3
Number of Monitors:  1
Number of Logical Video Cards:  1
Primary Display Resolution:  1920 x 1080
Desktop Resolution: 1920 x 1080
Primary Display Size: 18.78" x 10.55"  (21.54" diag)
                                        47.7cm x 26.8cm  (54.7cm diag)
Primary Bus: PCI Express 16x
Primary VRAM: 1024 MB
Supported MSAA Modes:  2x 4x 8x 16x 

Sound card:
Audio device: Nvidia GPU 0b HDMI/DP

Memory:
RAM: 2003 Mb

Miscellaneous:
UI Language: English
LANG: en_US.UTF-8
Microphone: Not set
Total Hard Disk Space Available: 598921 Mb
Largest Free Hard Disk Block: 203686 Mb

Installed software:

Recent Failure Reports:
Fri Feb 15 05:46:28 2013 GMT: file ''/tmp/dumps/assert_20130215004625_1.dmp'', upload yes: ''CrashID=bp-b4731449-5dae-48de-a77e-89dd82130214''
Fri Feb 15 05:50:57 2013 GMT: file ''/tmp/dumps/crash_20130215005055_1.dmp'', upload yes: ''CrashID=bp-e39f51c1-a767-4f60-9ecd-152e32130214''
Mon Feb 18 01:48:59 2013 GMT: file ''/tmp/dumps/assert_20130217204857_1.dmp'', upload yes: ''CrashID=bp-2183dc63-f5a8-4b7e-a04b-5ff702130217''

This was fixed for me by updating to xorg-server1.12 (1.12.4-3).

Thanks. Unfortunately I'll have to upgrade to at least F17 to get 1.12+. I guess it's time...

can confirm that in debian testing with xorg 1.12 it works correctly

The last build with the "raw mouse in..." option allows to fix it. Disabling that option fixes all the issues here.

There is a bug with Radeon Mobility HD4200 and xorg 1.12 and fglrx 8.97.100, so some people couldnt upgrade 1.11 -> 1.12.And Catalyst 13.1 does not support Xorg 1.13. But, weltall, thanks you for informing about this update, everything works now with that option disabled and xorg 1.11! Also I'm glad, that Valve devs does not ignore us - thx you :)

good news for me... I managed to install xorg 1.12 on F16 by telling yum to pretend I'm running F17. It pulled in the whole xorg universe but -- luckily -- nothing else; installed cleanly and everything works. And so I can also confirm that 1.12 fixes the mouse issue. Now off to kill some things... ;)

Does anyone following this bug still have this issue?

As mentioned above, since upping from x11-server 1.11.4 to x11-server 1.13.2 the issue went away for me :)

the same as dizietsma

Considering the original author ( https://github.com/ValveSoftware/steam-for-linux/issues/895#issuecomment-13665945 ) no longer has the issue and others confirm a more recent X solves it, closing out. Please make a new bug if this appears again.