Well i can F4 out of it, and outside of RetroPie it works fine, same with the controller, but if i try to configure any kind of device as a controller in RetroPie it has that problem.
I got a USB Hat on the pi and thats how i connect USB and ethernet to it. it got power LEDs for each of the inputs and nothing seems out of the ordinary with it when entering into EmulationStation, so i doubt that the Hat is the cause of the issue.