Sword of Vermilion

Sword of Vermilion (yes, it only has one L) is a Role-Playing Game, made for the Sega Genesis by Sega in 1989. It was part of the Sega Genesis Collection for the Playstation2 and is also available as a download for the Wii.

Eighteen years ago, the evil king Tsarkon from Cartahena defeated king Erik from Excalabria. As his castle collapsed around him, Erik bade his most trusted servant Blade to flee from the castle with Erik's infant son. Blade did so and raised the infant as his own in a remote village.

In the present day, the player takes on the role of Erik's son, now a grown adult. On his death bed, Blade tells him the truth and tasks the player to go on a quest to Set Right What Once Went Wrong.

This game provides examples of:
 * Big Bad: King Tsarkon. He is set up as an Evil Overlord but he has no involvement in the plot at all, only being mentioned a few times. You don't even encounter him before the Final Boss battle at the end of the game.
 * But Thou Must!: Slightly subverted early on, the first king you meet wants you to stop adventuring and become captain of the guard. You can't say no, and once you say yes you are forbidden to leave town. However, if you go back and confront the king again . It's played straight later on with a princess who wants to marry you. (And since she's pretty hot for a collection of 16-bit pixels, this may not be a bad thing for the hero...)
 * Color Coded for Your Convenience: There are only a handful of basic monster models, with stronger monsters being Palette Swaps of weaker ones, sometimes with different attacks. The Sorting Algorithm of Evil goes through green (weakest), blue, red, black, silver and gold (strongest).
 * Empty Room Psych: Just as you get used to treasures being hidden in every corner, the game gets stingier and stinger, and towards the end of the game pretty much every dead end is, well, just that.
 * Everything's Better with Princesses: The hero is actually a prince, and he does get to rescue and marry his own princess.
 * Faux First Person 3D
 * Fetch Quest: Every town has at least one, several have more. Most are mandatory to advance the plot. They are usually of the form of "Go to dungeon X and get me the MacGuffin hidden there." or "Go to dungeon Y and kick this bad monster's arse.".
 * Find the Cure: See Universal Poison below.
 * Frying Pan of Doom: You'd better be ready to jump at The Call as refusing to be a hero has painful consequences in one village...
 * Hyperactive Sprite: This happens with all of the non-player character in this game. You, oddly, stand still, rather than walk in place like everyone else.
 * Inexplicable Treasure Chests: This game is a standard example. Especially in the beginning, you find treasure chests almost everywhere, and every monster has a chance of dropping one, even monsters that could not logically be carrying a chest.
 * Infinity+1 Sword: The Death Sword is slightly stronger than the titular Sword of Vermilion, at the tradeoff of being cursed. It's even hidden in a Bonus Dungeon of sorts; it's not difficult to find as it's right there on the map, but unlike all other caves and dungeons, nobody asks you to go there or even mentions its existence.
 * Luke, I Am Your Father: Tsarkon tries to play this one on you at the final confrontation, but.
 * Moving the Goalposts: One particularly greedy king makes you go through three progressively larger and harder dungeons to get a ring you need. Eventually the hero gets fed up and forces the king at swordpoint to hand it over.
 * Penultimate Weapon: The titular Sword of Vermilion is the second strongest sword in the game. Getting it is even a bit of a Guide Dang It as the game only marginally hints at it and it is possible to completely miss it. Also, the items called Ultimate Sword and Ultimate Armor aren't, really. Also worth noting is that the strongest shield is simply bought in a shop, while the second-strongest shield requires a short Chain of Deals and can be missed.
 * Playable Epilogue: A minor one. After defeating the Final Boss and obtaining the last of the Plot Coupons, there are no more Random Encounters and you can freely visit all towns and talk with the NPCs, which compliment you with your achievements. But there is little else left to do except taking the Plot Coupons to their rightful place and watching the credits roll.
 * Plot Coupon: Tsarkon has the eight Rings of Evil. To confront him you will need the eight Rings of Good which are hidden throughout the land.
 * Randomly Drops: It is possible to get rare stat-enhancing items if you are lucky, but most of the random drops are only marginally useful. Also, if you leave the square where the battle occurred without picking up the spoils, then tough luck, it's gone.
 * Ring of Power: Sixteen of them in total, but you only need to collect eight of them.
 * Unexpected Gameplay Change: The interface for fighting a Boss Battle is completely different from the one for fighting Mooks.
 * The game is made of these. Exploring towns is a traditional 3/4s view console RPG setup with only movement in the four cardinal directions, exploring the wilderness and dungeons is a first-person viewpoint, enemy battles is back to 3/4s view with eight-way directions and realtime combat, and boss battles are a from-the-side one on one fight similar to a Tales game or a fighter.
 * Universal Poison: Used straight except in one event where the hero is affected by a poison that is much stronger than usual and resists all standard cures, leading to a Find the Cure scenario.
 * When All You Have Is a Hammer: When fighting Mooks you only have two choices, hack them to bits or nuke them with magic. Boss Battles don't even give you even that choice. Nope, no nuking that fireball-chucking demon from a distance, you'll have to go in there and whack it.
 * You Gotta Have Blue Hair: The hero of the game.