Cool idea for a thread.
What made me buy a PS1 was FF7. I remember reading about it in Gamepro Magazine and being absolutely amazed by how great it looked. CGI in a videogame was like "holy shit wtf" at the time.
Ignoring the fact that if Nintendo had gone with CDs, that likely would have meant a partnership with Sony (and thus no PS1), I think that things would have been completely different.
Squaresoft would have released FF7 on the N64 and many more third party developers would have followed suit. I think Nintendo lost the gen because they didn't go with CDs.