I assume that people look at it this way: they made AoD, it sold enough to pay for the next game (Colony Ship), if CS doesn't sell enough to pay for the next game, it failed and was a mistake. In reality AoD didn't sell all that well (which is why we didn't make AoD 2) and paid for 50% of Colony Ship's budget. Some of this shortfall was relatively 'easy' to fix - work longer hours and weekends for 7 years, how hard could it be? Others - not so much. In 2020 we had enough money only to pay the contractors and not the core team. We had to compromise at every step and constantly settle for less simply because we didn't have enough money and manpower. It wears you down more than anything else.
The tentative sequel will require a bigger team and a bigger budget. Nothing crazy but at least one extra designer to share the workload (more like to make it easier to breathe for the rest of us) and more contractors (art and 3D). Probably 25% more overall.
Colony Ship is doing better than AoD in nearly every aspect and metric. Stronger sales in EA, on launch, in the first 3 months, etc.
It will probably generate 60% of that increased budget, meaning we expect it to sell 40-50% more than AoD. The problem is, it won't be enough and neither KS not Patreon will make up for the difference. So we'll continue improving the game throughout 2024 and then we'll see. Maybe we'll get lucky. Maybe we won't