CCP is incredibly excited about their latest advertising opportunity. In a recent forum post, the company announced that a re-worked 30-second version of the EVE Online Incursion trailer will air in a number of theatres throught the US before TRON: Legacy.

The trailer will run from December 17 to January 13 and give fans a chance to see EVE Online on the big screen. Simultaneously, the re-worked trailer willl also be available on Youtube.

Are you excited to see EVE before TRON?

It's the season for giving, and the team at EVE Online has not forgotten how good it feels to give from the heart. This holiday season, players will be receiving the newest ship to roll off the production line: the Echelon.

Constructed in secrecy, the Echelon is a minor masterpiece of engineering, integrating otherwise incomprehensible Sansha technology into a frigate-class capsuleers vessel. The advanced cryptographic processors on board provide superior hacking capabilities for use on most known password-secured devices. However, the true beauty of the Echelon is in the adaptive synchronization of capsuleers and Sansha codebreaking components, creating a system predicted to give capsuleers an edge over even the strongest of the Nation's encryption locks.

Players will be able to redeem their holiday item through the log-in screen starting December 14. You will not be able to redeem holiday items past January 3, 2011, so don't forget to log in and get your ship as soon as possible!

CCP has been quite busy this week posting all sorts of EVE Online dev blog entries. Here are the topics they've covered in the past couple days:

• CCP Ph00ze has written an entry that provides an in-depth look at making faces with the new character creation system, which is scheduled to launch in mid-January 2011. You can see the level of detail you can achieve in the above image.
• Hjalti Daníelsson, aka CCP Abraxas, announced today in his entry that the EVE Chronicles are going on hiatus for a bit while the team works to flesh out the lore and make it mesh with the gameplay in what they call "The Wikipedia Experience." It going to be a major project and should further help immerse players in the game.
• Members of Team GridLock posted two video blogs on YouTube today to discuss topics like optimizing fighter-bombers and fleet jumping. You can watch them below.

CCP regularly talks about various EVE Online topics through written dev blogs, but this time around Senior Producer Arnar Hrafn Gylfason has used YouTube as the medium for his latest dev blog entry. You can watch both parts of the video blog after the jump.

Gylfason focuses on three topics: Incursion's multi-phased release schedule, the removal of learning skills, and the feedback that led CCP to shelve the idea to charge PLEX or ISK for neural remaps. The next portion of the Incursion expansion will go live on Dec. 14, which is when learning skills with be removed.

If you'd like to attend the seventh EVE Online Fanfest in Reykjavik, Iceland, it might be time to start planning the trip. The event won't be held until March 24-26, 2011, but early bird pricing and special packages are available now! Tickets to the event currently cost $75 each, but they'll jump up to $99 each after Dec. 26.

Complete hotel and travel packages that include Fanfest tickets are also available for purchase. Icelandair can fly you to Reykjavik from major cities throughout the world, including Boston, New York and Seattle. If you'd like to experience more of Iceland during your stay, you can take part in the Golden Circle Express tour on March 23 or enjoy the Blue Lagoon after-party on March 27.

In addition, the PLEX for Passes system allows players to purchase their Fanfest tickets using in-game ISK! One Fanfest Access Pass costs 6 PLEX, while one Sisters of EVE ticket costs 12 PLEX. Do you plan on attending the party at the top of the world?

EVE Online: Incursion 1.0.0 is now live on Tranquility! This is the first installment of the multi-part expansion, and it features more than 80 new storyline missions, the Noctis salvaging ship, rebalanced rockets and Tech 2 ammo, UI improvements, and more. Check out the patch notes and Incursion site for more information.

The second part of the Incursion launch will occur on Dec. 14, which is when learning skills will be removed and players will receive a holiday gift. The Incarna Character Creator will be implemented in mid-January 2011, followed a week later by the Sansha Incursions.

CCP announced a couple weeks ago that the first installment of EVE Online's Incursion expansion will launch on Nov. 30, but the team just confirmed it again and provided some extra details. According to the post, Incursion 1.0.0 will feature "a new salvaging ship, the Noctis, a vast number of player-requested improvements and fixes as well as important server-side optimizations." Check out the patch notes and Incursion site for more information.

The second part of the Incursion launch will occur on Dec. 14, which is when learning skills will be removed. The key features of the expansion, such as the Incarna Character Creator and Sansha Incursions, will be implemented in January 2011.

Does anyone else just love how these CCP EVE Online blogs are worded? Who knew you could have so much fun with a developer blog! Anyway, as to the content of the blog itself, CCP has confirmed that they want to completely abolish all learning skills from EVE Online by as early as Christmas time, if everything goes well enough with their software and QA milestones. As to how they plan to implement these changes, today marks the day when all NPC sell orders for the eleven skills in the Learning group (a.k.a. "Learning Skills") will be canceled completely.

As for the changes that CCP hopes to implement by December 14, you can read what they've got outlined after the jump.

Last month, CCP gave players on the test server the option to purchase a neural remap, or redistribution of attributes, with PLEX. Following a negative response from players and the Council of Stellar Management, CCP has shelved the idea to charge PLEX or ISK for remaps and changed their thinking regarding the sale of virtual goods. CCP Zulu has written a dev blog entry that explains the company's new strategy:

"Virtual goods sales in EVE Online will evolve through sales of vanity items, first in Incarna but later in-space features. The scope will be (and there‘s no design be done around this, we‘re just talking strategy now) that anything that doesn‘t affect gameplay directly can be, potentially, sold for PLEX or other means. Ideas that have come up include Incarna clothing and furniture, logos on spaceships and swapping out portraits. This is by no means a comprehensive list, nor is it a commitment that said items will be available for sale, I mention these as an example for what type of items we‘re thinking about."

Zulu ends the blog entry by saying that CCP must react to the wishes of the market or risk becoming "the dinosaurs of the industry." Do you agree with their new stance on the sale of virtual goods?

Looking for the perfect holiday gift for your EVE Online player? Here's your chance to get some shopping done early. CCP has announced that the EVE store will be discounting several items now until November 22.

Fans can get $30 off any EVE Ship model using the coupon code NOVShip10. Other sale items include the EVE Conquest board game for $59.99, EVE Poker Deck for $7.99, and EVE Magneat for $7.99. Head on over to the EVE store now and make the holidays extra special for the EVE Online player in your life.