Yeah no, it wasn't prejudice that erased them, but budget and quality. I mean just look at three screenshots of these games tell me you'd be as excited about them as you'd be about World of Warcraft, as a kid.
World of WarCraft, on the other hand, I knew exactly what it was because me and my friends and cousins had all been playing WarCraft and StarCraft since around 1995 or so.
But MapleStory? I couldn't even have told you with certainty if it was even actually a game or not. Turns out it is, but I didn't know that back then. I just looked and saw that it released in NA in 2005, that was halfway through highschool for me but I never met a single person there or in college that played it. If lots of people were playing it, I have no idea who they were.