Being a top 4 most played map on Faceit despite not being available for half of 2025 already tells you a lot. Despite being a relatively new map. It was fun, Competitively viable and loved by community
I didn’t like it when Anubis was removed back then, and I still don’t like it now. It was one of the most fun and genuinely unique layout map in CS. It was taken out during a period when the CT economy was extremely punishing, but that economy was later patched to be far more forgiving. I wonder How would Anubis play today under the current CT economy? Realistically, it would likely feel much more balanced and even better than before.
Inferno, on the other hand, has become a strong contender for removal, and there are clear technical reasons behind it. In CS2, Inferno suffers heavily from choke point overload and utility spam due to utilities being powerful in CS2 ( Biggar smokes and open skybox) . Banana and mid are almost entirely defined by grenade exchanges, making early round interaction repetitive and stale.
On top of that, Inferno’s pacing feels very slow. Rounds often stall into late executes with little variation, and retake scenarios is extremely difficult for CTs due to harder layout so Most retakes end up being save simulator.
Inferno went from feeling like it could overtake Mirage as the most played map at Faceit toward the end of CSGO to barely edging out a newly introduced de_train in 2025 . That’s a massive fall for what used to be a pillar of the map pool.
So the question is. Should Anubis be considered as a replacement for either Inferno or Overpass ( least played map) ? From a gameplay perspective, Inferno makes the strongest case.
The only real downside to Anubis returning is aesthetics. The current map pool already leans heavily toward dusty and sandy environments because of Dust2 and Mirage. But even then, Anubis is by far the best looking dusty map and, more importantly, one that plays exceptionally well.
It deserves a comeback. The community clearly enjoys it, and the stats back that up. The numbers do not lie.