it is not that crazy- china just banned production and india cracked down/counterfeits surged. etizolam and brotizolam are still used in several countries, sometimes widely.
there were more than a couple worthy that were widely available- I'm not sure what you mean by "we'd probably know by now" but it sounds like they passed you by entirely. they were often overlooked as 1. regular etizolam was still legal in china for a long long time, 2. the RC benzo scene was at its peak with flubromazolam, clonazolam, chinese alprazolam and then flualprazolam.
fluclotizolam (is to etizolam what flualprazolam is to alprazolam) got some traction, flubrotizolam saw massive production but was more of a unique/different thieno buzz than etizolam or fluclotizolam with its different structure.
there is not much money in producing awesome novelties like this compared to producing as much of the current, most alprazolam-like chemical known by CN labs.