https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/arcengames/ai-war-ii I know the Space Sector crowd includes a number of fans of AI War and Arcen Games in general. I'm posting this link to their AI War 2 project to help spread the word.
Actually, they relaunched with a lower goal, and succeeded. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/arcengames/ai-war-ii-0
Yep - it is very difficult these days to raise funding I'm afraid. The developer of Star Ruler 2 said that was one of the reasons they gave up. To make Star Ruler 3, they would have needed $1 million USD.