Wasn't there a fatal flaw on the system related to textures?
4KB texture memory ... i.e. approx 64x64 pixels (really, less), and a relatively-long latency when changing the contents of texture memory.
Thus, the use as-far-as-possible, of simple repeating textures, or single-color Gouraud-shaded polys.
Sorry ... that's the simplest way that I can explain it (I suspect that Nintendo can't be bothered to enforce my NDA anymore).