Comment by phendrenad2

The SNES was, objectively, a huge jump over the previous generation (NES, Master System, etc.). Much better sound, 16-bit color, pseudo-3D with Mode 7, support for much much larger carts, support for coprocessors within the cart... An expansion port for a hypothetical CD-ROM addon (spoiler). I think that the revolution>evolution>revolution is revisionist, or at least something they said much later on. SNES might have started as a luxury option, as all consoles do, but it was obviously intended to compete with whatever Sega put out for that generation (and compared to the Genesis, Sega pulled out a few tricks so in the end the SNES wasn't a huge step above the Genesis either).