Sony saved nothing in the PS1 era. It was the fact that Sony and Nintendo kept standards in line and flushed out the absolute flood of bad consoles(not saying all were bad). That kept the gaming industry in check in the 90s. Hell, it even showed how bad Sega was at the time. Now we have 2 clone consoles and a underestimated one flop swapping for love. 

I think if the NES didn't basically define what we know as the modern gaming business that PC gaming would've eventually taken over. We all probably would've grown up playing more games on our home computer, much like a lot of kids in Europe did. 

Sony really didn't "save" anyone from anything, Sony fans never give Sega credit, when in actuality they did most/all of what they try to give Sony credit for. Sega already had brought Nintendo in line and done the whole "lets market to teenagers/adults" thing already. In fact Sony actually stole a lot of Sega's employees when launching the Playstation, so they weren't doing anything new, they were just copying Sega. 

Go read "The Console Wars" book (which ironically is going to be turned into a movie by Sony Pictures) to understand gaming history better. Sony just took what Sega was already doing and capitalized on Sega of Japan crippling Sega of America with bad decisions.