BlueStacks 5 offers a hidden "Android 4.4 KitKat" instance through its multi-instance manager, which is near-identical in performance requirements to ICS. While BlueStacks is known for gaming, its "High FPS" mode works perfectly for Android 4.0 UI.
VMware offers the best GPU acceleration for ICS-era graphics (OpenGL ES 2.0).
While "Android 40" doesn't exist as a version yet (the current latest is Android 15 ), you can achieve "extra quality" and peak performance on modern emulators by focusing on hardware acceleration and high-resolution rendering.
Achieving "extra quality" in an emulator for this specific version requires moving beyond the laggy, basic tools of 2012 and utilizing modern virtualization.
Using a root file explorer (install SuperSU via a flashable ZIP), edit /system/build.prop :
