As a proof of concept it is very good but as others have said the issue is licensing for with most of them. So what about all the old games that ran on early Macs back in the day? Surely some of those might be licensable? There must be a load of old Mac game developers still out there who could use a few more checks in the mail?
It's funny how the companies that own the ips don't want to put any effort into re-releasing them. Namco made some games available on iOS, but that was back during iOS 6. They broke under iOS 7 and to my knowledge, they never fixed it.
Now that you can run 3rd party apps on the Apple TV, it's just a matter of coaxing these companies to make the games run on it.
Nintendo, which has its own problems, may end up doing what Sega did and stop making hardware and just make games for multiple platforms. They have been eyeing Apple for awhile and always dismiss making games for iOS. Since they have fallen from the #1 spot some time ago, they might just change their minds if a decent developer for iOS can convince them to make not just arcade games, but some of their beloved exclusive platform titles for tvOs. Others will follow if they do.
It's funny how the companies that own the ips don't want to put any effort into re-releasing them. Namco made some games available on iOS, but that was back during iOS 6. They broke under iOS 7 and to my knowledge, they never fixed it.
Those are signs that those titles don't sell very well. If there's money to be made, the effort will be put in to get it. Some classic games like Frogger, PacMan (Namco), Tetris are doing well on mobile but not all classic games are as popular. Street Fighter is on iOS already, the older versions were listed in the emulator.
There are also more licensing issues with older software because they often setup business deals where musicians and other parties (voice cast, celebrities) get royalties from the sales. If companies go bankrupt over time and IP rights are passed on then those people can start looking for payments or start making demands about the development. Some game creators sell the rights of their own products entirely to companies. Tim Schafer discovered this trying to bring one of his own games back from the dead and onto modern platforms:
Sometimes it's musicians who own broadcast rights to the in-game music where Youtube has to mute the whole audio track if it appears in a video of someone playing the game. Sometimes the IP owners just don't want playthroughs broadcast as it can offer an experience like playing the game. If someone filmed themselves watching a movie, they couldn't upload that to Youtube as it violates the movie copyright.
The old games that were on platforms like Atari, Nintendo etc aren't owned by those people. They were owned by dozens of different publishers and developers, many of whom don't exist any more. You can't appeal to Nintendo to allow emulation of every game that was on the Nintendo because they don't have the rights to all of those games. Console emulation will always be officially unsupported for these reasons and it'll be limited to the platform owners who use it for backwards compatibility.
When it comes to really old games, the hardware was so slow that they can be run in Javascript in a standard browser:
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Now that you can run 3rd party apps on the Apple TV, it's just a matter of coaxing these companies to make the games run on it.
Nintendo, which has its own problems, may end up doing what Sega did and stop making hardware and just make games for multiple platforms. They have been eyeing Apple for awhile and always dismiss making games for iOS. Since they have fallen from the #1 spot some time ago, they might just change their minds if a decent developer for iOS can convince them to make not just arcade games, but some of their beloved exclusive platform titles for tvOs. Others will follow if they do.
Those are signs that those titles don't sell very well. If there's money to be made, the effort will be put in to get it. Some classic games like Frogger, PacMan (Namco), Tetris are doing well on mobile but not all classic games are as popular. Street Fighter is on iOS already, the older versions were listed in the emulator.
There are also more licensing issues with older software because they often setup business deals where musicians and other parties (voice cast, celebrities) get royalties from the sales. If companies go bankrupt over time and IP rights are passed on then those people can start looking for payments or start making demands about the development. Some game creators sell the rights of their own products entirely to companies. Tim Schafer discovered this trying to bring one of his own games back from the dead and onto modern platforms:
http://www.polygon.com/2015/1/27/7921837/grim-fandango-remastered-interview-double-fine-disney-lucasfilm-sony
The royalties issue has been affecting videos of people playing games:
http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2015-01-30-pewdiepie-criticizes-nintendos-lets-play-plans
Sometimes it's musicians who own broadcast rights to the in-game music where Youtube has to mute the whole audio track if it appears in a video of someone playing the game. Sometimes the IP owners just don't want playthroughs broadcast as it can offer an experience like playing the game. If someone filmed themselves watching a movie, they couldn't upload that to Youtube as it violates the movie copyright.
The old games that were on platforms like Atari, Nintendo etc aren't owned by those people. They were owned by dozens of different publishers and developers, many of whom don't exist any more. You can't appeal to Nintendo to allow emulation of every game that was on the Nintendo because they don't have the rights to all of those games. Console emulation will always be officially unsupported for these reasons and it'll be limited to the platform owners who use it for backwards compatibility.
When it comes to really old games, the hardware was so slow that they can be run in Javascript in a standard browser:
https://archive.org/details/internetarcade
If webapps work on the ?TV then they could probably bundle MAME games that way without Apple's approval.