Subjectively at least - and this might be rose-tinted glasses influencing my judgment - it feels like it was more common, that certain genres were almost expected to come with an accessible level/map editor. I think I spent more time with the one from Age of Empires than the actual game.

I remember finally getting my hands on the editor for the Build engine after a few years of making maps in Doom and Heretic and had thought 3D level design was only something super geniuses could do... Until Hammer showed it was just the garbage UI/UX of Build lol