> Apple do have a robust high-performance API, Metal.
Metal is neither robust, or, arguably, high-performance when compared to DirectX or Vulkan.
> Arguably it has the best ergonomics of any of the low-level graphics APIs.
It's not a low-level API. By Apple's own admission, Metal is hopelessly high-level and can only achieve the ergonomics it has by abstracting away all the features that gamedevs care about and putting the keys to the kingdom in Apple's hands.
> All relevant game engines already have Metal support, too.
I like how you qualify this with "relevant", as if I'd come up with a list of all the engines without Metal support and you'd wave them away as irrelevant since they don't support Metal. Plus, Metal isn't just a compilation target. A "port" to Apple Silicon doesn't entail checking off a new box on the compiler, it's a long and arduous process of porting shaders, bytecode, 32-bit libraries, x86-based libraries, API calls and more. Since Apple provides game developers no incentive to do that work, they continue to refuse porting to their system.
> There's even an equivalent to DXVK in MoltenVK. It's not that different from Microsoft's position.
Yeah, except the main difference is that DXVK gets near-native performance, while MoltenVK is far too slow to be considered for regular use. Do you honestly think a Proton-like compatibility layer could be built on a technology that needs to translate Vulkan code into a higher-level, slower API? Keep dreaming.
> It's possible Apple might make an M1 Apple TV with a decent GPU. Like the Macbook Air, it's likely it'd be cheaper to manufacture than competitors with similar performance. I suppose we'll see.
Comedy-freaking-gold right here. Let's say that you're right, and Apple does release an Apple TV with an M1 processor in it. I'm going to give you an insane benefit of the doubt, and we'll assume that they cut down the price to $500 (using the Mac Mini as a starting point). At peak performance, the M1 can churn through a measly 2.4 teraflops. There are last-gen consoles that were faster than that, not even to compare them to the 11 teraflops that the Xbox Series X and Playstation 5 pump out. Okay, so let's put a faster GPU in there: the M1 has 8 GPU cores, so getting it to be as embarrassingly parallel as it's peers would require us to multiply it's core count by 4 or 5 factors. That would require a whopping 32 GPU cores, the same amount that the $2500+ Macbook Pros carry. If they did make a $500 console of that ilk, they'd be losing money on every unit shipped for the GPU alone.
I genuinely have no idea where you're getting any of this stuff. Maybe read up on game development before responding?