Now add in the Nintendo-made classics. Mario, Zelda, Metroid, Donkey Kong Country, Killer Instinct, Earthbound, F-Zero, Kirby, Punch-Out, Tetris, Yoshi...all the various entries in these iconic franchises.
Pretty much this is what SNES was for me, and Faceball 2000. lol
Mix in some of the best in their respective series titles and the definitive editions of games like Super R-Type, Super Castlevania IV, Contra III, Super Ghouls & Ghosts, Earthworm Jim and three Super Star Wars titles.
All that and you have the best system of the 16-bit era.
You've got to credit the Genesis though for having many highly regarded shoot-em-ups. That system has
soooo many shoot-em-ups. Ironically, my favorite one from back in the day is Gradius III (which was an SNES game).
It seems by SNES, Nintendo had cemented an audience for their franchises, Sega kinda failed to do that with Master System, I believe in part thanks to Nintendo's shady monopoly on the industry. With Genesis's success I think Sega was attempting to establish some solid IPs, but wasn't able to grab the attention away from those anticipating the next Mario or Zelda. A lot of first party Sega games on Genesis (aside from Sonic) were almost ignored in comparison to Nintendo. I don't know, I guess Genesis was assumed to be the sports game system, that didn't have anything like what Nintendo had, but that really wasn't true. Aside from RPGs, well it did have RPGs, but never gained much traction with them. The most notable being Phantasy Star (Sega's Final Fantasy) and Beyond Oasis (Sega's Legend of Zelda).
Just to gauge popularity, how many Genesis games are over $75? Now, how many SNES games are over $75? There's a good indicator of staying power.
I don't think that's a good way to gauge popularity of the game itself. How many obscure NA soccer games on SNES are over $100? Either soccer games are the bees knees on SNES, or Nintendo collector's be crazy. I think they be out of their mind, personally. A lot of people collect just to collect on the system.