But now, it cannot save. I'm running it on the lxde desktop because I couldn't run any program that can turn a controller's joystick into a mouse in a port game
Glad you figured it out. Personally I love Dosbox pure. The way it lets you pick files to execute, then set an autostart is brilliant for first install. And the way it autoconfigures a controller map for a good chunk of games. Quite excellent.
Well, actually after some more research, as of the current version, the 0.11, there si no way to do this, but only when restarting a game already launched, instructions are in the official github project page here.