Im not even gonna get into this fam .I been listening to both since jump basically myself. I know my ears g...Nas IS A FLAT OUT ALL AROUND better rapper than Mega...Nas does a plethora of things better than Mega as a pure rapper. .AT MOST Mega is bout equal to Nas in like a couple areas...but overall..no contest...and this is the problem now ..them QB nikkas let Mega's rep gas him to the point of jealousy for Nas...hes like the popular nikka who everybody fukked wit in the hood and thought was the man and nikkas had a biased point of view towards...thats really about it...and its why Mega couldnt handle attention and popularity Nas got...cause he was older than Nas and ooked up to in the hood and kinda looked at Nas as his lil homie...but when they got out in the REAL WORLD and out of the hood the more objective point of view hit him like bricks and hurt his ego...which is exactly what hurt his career in the long run..he thought just cause he had a rep and was the man in QB...he would be the man everywhere...Trag was kinda on that same shyt...to a lesser extent tho...
We can agree to disagree on ability...
As far as the history goes....my understanding is this...
Way back in the late 80s and early 90's Trag was the man...the next one...the golden child...but he got locked up, which delayed his fame.
Everyone else around him blew up in the Juice Crew (Kane, G-Rap, etc). So he fell off the radar...he still made albums, but that delay hurt his popularity as Intelligent Hoodlum.
Mega then came along, moved to QB permanently and was the new kid and killing it in QB rap and street wise(Marley even said this). Yes nikkaz like Nas were influenced by him and Traj...you can hear it in his rhyme scheme. But Mega was the most feared and respected rapper in those years...EVERYONE (cept maybe Tragedy) will tell you that.
Mega got locked up around 91-92'....BUT prior to that he had a deal with marley Marl...who was also managing Lords of the Underground at the time... he would have dropped his album around the same time as Mobb Deeps Juvenile Hell...and he definitely had the potential to BLOW because back then you could rap the way QB dudes were rapping and actually sell records...
Once Mega got locked up, Nas stepped up as the ONE and Only dude with that nice of a style...and the rest is history...
Now it gets murkey around 96 or so...with Mega getting released from jail and Nas picking him up for the Firm....I've heard both sides, from Nas saying Mega was jelous and didn't want to go with the industry rules... (which is possible) to Mega saying Nas and Steve Sout were trying to extort him with industry cronyism. Mega was eventually dropped, Nature was picked up...and Mega went at both of them (Mega claims it was the other way around)
Mega signed with Def Jam, made an album, then it got shelved...they were too busy promoting top notch selling artists by that time...like Busta and DMX...
Mega grew tired and eventually got them to release him, but they did not want to give him the Testament album...Mega let them keep it and made the Realness then went completely indepedent and that's what it was...
Everything I'm saying can be verified...even from online sources.