DKC didn't used a chip. They rendered the characters on workstations (Silicon Graphics if I'm remebering it correctly) and transformed on sprites to give the game a more advanced look. It was the first home console game with pre-rendered graphics (Killer Instinct was the first on arcades. I believe).

Genesis easily had more powerful commercials.  Explosions, bullies getting beaten up, angry black guys yelling at people--if we could factor those commercials in, Genesis would dominate Nintendo.

I guessed it used

My only complain with SNES was the game with blood... Mortal Kombat was a great example because in Mega Drive it was a fucking new game compared with SNES version... Nintendo didn't approved the blood and most of fatalities was removed to something more kids... the Mega Drive version conserved everything found in Arcade with downgrade graphics... the best version.

It also had enough power to make Siskel and Ebert do this:

I'm pretty sure that the Activater killed Gene Siskel and gave Roger Ebert cancer.

I never had a Genesis (or Mega drive), althought my friend had it, but I understand the Genesis was faster and the SNES was better on everything else. That said, the SNES had the square and nintendo exclusives, which where a big deal.

SNES had way better hardware except for the cpu speed, if you compare youtube vids of Zombies Ate My Neighbors you'll see superior sound/music the SNES could produce. Plus it had Mario World, Super Metroid, Legend of Zelda, Donkey Kong Country, Final Fantasy Mystic Quest, 2, and 3. Genesis had some great games too, but I think SNES had the best games in addition to the more capable hardware.

Yes, I remembered back in the day how that impressed me, Yoshi Island used the FX Chip for it´s neat effects, but DK was all SNES with no steroids added.

It was such a simple time, nowdays nothing impress the kids anymore, all the magic is gone...

I grew up playing SNES and assumed that Genesis was more powerful.  But looking back at screenshot comparisons, the SNES versions of the same games definitely look better.  So SNES.

The SNES came out over 2 years AFTER the Genesis, despite being a HUGE fan of Sega and the Genesis back in those days, in total the SNES was better equipped and could deliver more refined games, if only because Nintendo was not hesitant to add helper chips in most cartridges to compensate for the anemic CPU that the machine shipped with.

So the strong point of the Genesis were:

 - Slightly higher screen resolution

 - The ability to draw much more sprites on the screen before flickering and slow downs occured (compared to a stock SNES)

 - Very fast Motorolla 68000 CPU (compared to other affordable consoles of the time) it allowed for raster effects in software that sometimes seemed close enough to "mode 7 effects" in some cases

For the SNES:

 - Much more colors (total and on the screen)

 - Hardware scaling and rotation (albeit limited, but it permitted things like f-zero/mario cart that are impossible at 60FPS on the Genesis)

 - More flexible sound chip

 - Nintendo's willingness to add extra chips in individual cartridges to compensate for the weaker CPU of the machine

Now in the end many Genesis games had great music (In the right hands it could sign! examples: Streets of Rage 2, Super Shinobi, Thunder Force series) and some with amazing graphics as well (Tunder Force IV, Shinobi 3, Phantasy Star IV) as well as impressive special effects (Super Turican, Super Contra, Fantasy Zone)

However great these games are, they could not be mistaken for the SNES show pieces of the day either: Final Fantasy 6, Crono Cross, Super Metroid (mostly for the music, the graphics in it were probably not out of reach) Tales of Symphony, f-zero, or the Donkey Kong games...