Wait, by "reload the entire game" do you mean closing and opening the program? RPGMV's default reload button is F5 (not entirely sure why this was changed from F12), this works in any situation. You still have to sit through the fairly short opening screen, but it's definitely better than having to close + run the program every time.
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Oh, shit, that was exactly what I was looking for. I figured there'd be such a button, good thing I thought to ask! :)
... well, I tried it and it's slightly less convenient than what TLS had (in that one it just sent you to the main menu directly, in this one it reboots the entire game so I have to resize the window again), but it's still better than having to reopen the game manually!