After having played a portion of this game and now finished Reload, I kind of wish I stuck with this one because I found that Reload almost made Tartarus trivial and too fun. Looking back, I think that Tartarus in the original was a much more effective metaphor for depression, but games that are more conceptual that sacrifice gameplay enjoyability for something that suits the themes of the game more will always be controversial; look at Rain World. I think I'll go back and play FES someday, but if I had actually finished my FES playthrough when I started it in 2021, the ending might have hit even harder when I was at probably the lowest point in my life.
Weird comparison but I always found a weird cross between this game and the album Mount Eerie idk something about the way both portray death has been stuck with me for a while I can’t really explain it
(Not cheap at all just not over 200€)