They have a large publisher (Paradox Interactive) who prescribes their schedules. They also made bet bookings from Cities: Skylines that put them quite evidently in AAA. Finally, they release the games for all major platforms. All together, this describes a AAA game developer.
In contrast, an AA developer would work with publishers like Annapurna Interactive, Devolver Digital or Team 17, while a III game would have a much smaller scope - like The Witness, The Stanley Parable, or Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice. It is clear that Colossal Order doesn’t work with a small publisher or make games of indie scope.
If you were just sealioning, don’t do that please.
That’s a very good resource, nice find! I think we can agree CO is between AA and AAA. I think it leans much more on the AAA side from my industry experience, but arguments could be made that it’s not all the way there and that therefore it’s AA. But this is a bit semantic. They make AAA money and have AAA standards and marketing. And that’s a bit unusual for 40 people, of which 10 are probably admin and 30 are dev.
This all could easily stem from a couple of key people leaving and chaos breaking loose, or from extreme time pressure by the publishers.