i remember the era as pretty unbroken excellence and excitement all the way through 92 to end of 96 (and i can infer historically that although i wasn't involved it was unbroken excellence / excitement 1990-1996, just judging by the records that came out)
but there was a shift in 94
before then you could be a patriot for all of hardcore, it was the full circumference thing, there was this spectrum of moods, feels, vibes, etc, all encompassed in a single dj set or even within the clash and mood-meld of a single track. it didn't even feel like a "spectrum", it was just what it was -that oxymoronic plenitude, a chaos
but then it got into this thing where it was so big that it started to schism internally (rather than containing the schismatic elements within the same frame) and you had dominant flavours that became a bit oppressive - the constituent elements started to separate out into strands rather than coexisting within the same set / tune. before that you would have tunes that breaks and hip hoppy elements, but also roots and dancehall ragga elements, and soul-y / housey diva parts, or pure pop parts, or soundtracky filmic element - but also some wafts of arty ambient, all in the same six minutes
so as 94 shifted to 95, you would still be patriotic for the whole sound / culture in a vague way, but when it got to specifics, you would really root for a particular forward-sector within hardcore/jungle, that was offering some kind of alternative or breath of fresh air to the dominant flavour (still pretty exciting don't get me wrong, just a bit unrelieved)
so yeah with 94 obviously the ragga-jungle is the oppressive dominant vibe, and it just got wearying hearing the same kind of tunes, or "The Burial" getting wheeled out seven times a night.
then 95 came the flood of musicality and bongos-horror, on one side, versus this very tight crisp de-ragga-ized but still rough-tough sound that was being played at the bigger events
techstep was a relief and a counter-move against both of those tendencies - dark, bombastic, apocalyptic grandeur
then that became equally oppressive
i seem to remember starting in 95 always feeling like one vital element of the mix in 92-93-94 was missing - whether it was the fun, or the darkness, or whatever - you couldn't get the full package
e.g. happy hardcore had the fun but it didn't have the ruffness or darkness or atmospherics and consequently as a night out quickly became unbearable.