How to properly set up debugging for a TypeScript Node.js project using decorators and ES modules?

I have a TypeScript Node.js project that uses:

• Experimental decorators ("experimentalDecorators": true)
• Emit decorator metadata ("emitDecoratorMetadata": true)
• ES modules ("module": "NodeNext" and "moduleResolution": "NodeNext")
• TypeORM entities with decorators

My build setup includes:

• A tsconfig.json configured with the above compiler options.
• A build script that runs tsc --build (the TypeScript compiler).
• A start script that runs something like:

  tsc-watch --onSuccess "node dist/src/server.js" --onFailure "echo Cannot compile."
  

When I run npm start, everything works perfectly - the app runs without any errors.

However, when trying to debug the project in VS Code, using ts-node, tsx, or similar approaches, I encounter errors such as unknown .ts file extensions, decorator metadata not loading, or ES module import issues.

I tried several VS Code launch.json configurations, including:

{
  "type": "node",
  "request": "launch",
  "name": "Debug Server",
  "runtimeArgs": ["--loader", "ts-node/esm"],
  "program": "${workspaceFolder}/src/server.ts",
  "sourceMaps": true,
  "skipFiles": ["<node_internals>/**"]
}

The server actually starts, but then TypeORM fails with:

No metadata for "X" was found.

This is how the data source is created:

const ds = new DataSource({
  ...
  entities: ['dist/src/entity/**/*.js'],
  subscribers: ['dist/src/subscriber/**/*.js']
});

Why might decorator metadata not be loaded correctly when running via ts-node/esm even if the server starts?