The other problem is that modern graphics APIs got so complex that they're intimidating even to experienced developers.

That 'first triangle on screen' code can now look something like this - https://github.com/KhronosGroup/Vulkan-Samples/blob/main/sam... - compared to the simpler old days of OpenGL (https://github.com/gamedev-net/nehe-opengl/blob/master/vc/Le...)

That's the argument for general-purpose rendering engines. These offer an API comparable to three.js. The API at that level is much easier to deal with than the API at the Vulkan level. Usually, about a page of code will put a glTF model on the screen.

But fast, general purpose rendering engines are hard. Not impossible, just hard. In open source land, we have about a half dozen examples of My First Rendering Engine, and they mostly work. But they don't scale.