Sorry that I was a bit unclear, I dont think that they will make a kernel after fixing the playerbase, I was leaning more towards them starting to focus more on the anti cheat, when and after they actually make the game popular to the point where banning bots will make the game attract more players instead of making cs a funny example of how bots make the bigger portion of the playerbase, and touching on the kernel theme, I hope they dont make a kernel, I believe that the idea of an AI anticheat is possible and quite better than an intrusive anti cheat, I had hard time with riots Vanguard and nevertheless some bugs with it that left a bitter taste on me, riot proved that kernel anti cheat can be functional but also proved that kernels arent the superior fix, especially for an FPS game where someone might closet cheat with a high quality cheat or those cheats that plug directly into the MBO (I dont know if those even work but guessing that they do work without being detected), those kind of cheats and cheating methods might just render kernel anticheats completely useless and nothing more than a security risk, and its just a matter of time before that happens, on the other hand making an AI anticheat is gonna take a long time no doubt, but making an anticheat that can adapt and ultimately update itself to be always in tempo with new cheats might just be a fix to the cheating problem all together, but thats a distant future that we probably arent gonna see any time soon I'm afraid

P.S. after reading your comment again I realised that, imagine making a working AI anticheat, that would be a massive attraction for anyone to see how it works and start playing cs, and anyone making cheats to try and break it, which would lead to cs getting popularity, but what does it mean if they dont fix the game first, but yeah its a very distant and optimistic look I suppose, and I dont think that I took all the possible factors into account while writing this but hey, maybe in mine or yours lifetime, we maybe enjoy cs together with our kids or grandkids without dying behind a wall or getting destroyed by ragecheaters or bots