That is not the problem. Even emulating the apps isn't the core problem.
Drivers, and support for the vast range of x86 hardware, was the problem, and secondarily, using the underlying hardware and supporting an MMU, memory protection, and preemptive multitasking... those were the big problems, and in the end, all Apple's attemps to solve them failed, and it moved to UNIX.
That worked, but it needed to happen when it became viable to run the entire "legacy" OS in a VM, and that didn't come until around the turn of the century. That was not feasible in 1992.
You might be surprised. Apple did an x86 port of Classic MacOS, based on DR-DOS.
https://lowendmac.com/2014/star-trek-apples-first-mac-os-on-...
That is not the problem. Even emulating the apps isn't the core problem.
Drivers, and support for the vast range of x86 hardware, was the problem, and secondarily, using the underlying hardware and supporting an MMU, memory protection, and preemptive multitasking... those were the big problems, and in the end, all Apple's attemps to solve them failed, and it moved to UNIX.
That worked, but it needed to happen when it became viable to run the entire "legacy" OS in a VM, and that didn't come until around the turn of the century. That was not feasible in 1992.