Pre ~2001, when the XBox and GameCube mostly converged on PC-alike hardware, as opposed to bizarrely-different console architectures. After that, it felt like

Pre ~2001, when the XBox and GameCube mostly converged on PC-alike hardware, as opposed to bizarrely-different console architectures. After that, it felt like multiplatform releases on console were "easy enough" that AAA began always targeting them in game design. Prior to that, AAA PC titles didn't really give a damn about consoles, which only maybe received a some-features-included reimplementation if the game was a hit.