MMO developer Spacetime Studios is laying off about half of its 32-person staff as it struggles to find a publishing deal for its Blackstar IP.

Spacetime previously had an agreement with NCsoft to publish the science-fiction MMO, but in January of this year, the publisher canceled the project. Since then, the developer says it's been self-funded during its search for a new deal.

"We have been shopping Blackstar around, but right now, at least,the concept of a SciFi space/ground IP has proven to be a challenge," says Spacetime on its official blog.

"Our studio cannot survive at its current burn rate without a publishing deal, so we face a necessary (though very difficult and painful) decision," reads the recent post. "We are scaling down from thirty-two down to sixteen folks in the hopes of developing a pitch, a prototype and another publishing deal."

[The preceding article by Leigh Alexander originally appeared on Worlds in Motion sister site Gamasutra.]