About once a year, EVE Online hosts a 64 team tournament to decide who the greatest pilots in the universe are. It's called The Alliance Tournament, and it's a chance for alliances to etch their names in EVE's 7 year long history. Signups for alliance spots in the tournament went live today and go to April 23rd.

The Alliance Tournament isn't for every group of players, however, especially not those who are thrifty with their in-game currency. Every alliance wishing to enter must pay a 2 Billion ISK sign up fee just for the chance to snag one of the coveted tourney spots. If an Alliance isn't accepted for a regular tourney spot, they will be refunded their sign-up fee and have a chance to buy one of 16 tourney spots that will be auctioned for a starting bid of 1 billion ISK. Sixteen Tournament spots will be reserved for competitors from last year's Alliance Tournament, including two-time winner Pandemic Legion.

The Alliance Tournament entrants will be announced on April 26th and the first round will begin on June 5th. The tournment will be covered by EVE TV and various in-game radio stations. Check out the Alliance Tournament page for more details.

Throughout its lifespan, EVE Online has constantly found a way to bring new players into their fold. Whether that's through amazing trial plans or constantly updating tutorials, the developers at CCP are always giving their old and new players alike something new to sink their teeth into or experience. With the upcoming arrival of DUST 514 looming in the horizon, EVE Online's dev team has refocused their efforts into helping players establish connections with the planets that they've flown around so many times in the past. With the brand new look given to them in Dominion, each pilot can now meddle with the affairs going on on a given world.

At GDC 2010, we had the opportunity to speak with one of the CCP leaders to learn more about our new planetary affairs, and you can discover those secrets with us by watching our EVE Online preview video! Just keep your eyes moving past the break to explore all the new information.

CCP has announced that Tyrannis, the next EVE Online expansion, is coming in Summer 2010. According to a dev blog entry, the expansion focuses on the exploration and industry of planets. You'll be able to survey for deposits of minerals, build infrastructure, and more. As CCP t0rfifrans puts it, "ALL THESE WORLDS ARE YOURS."

Combat won't be enabled on these planets in Tyrannis, but that's coming in future expansions to connect EVE with DUST 514. You can read more about Tyrannis after the jump.

CCP announced today that the eighth EVE Online Alliance Tournament will be kicking off in June, and the team is once again looking for PvP experts to act as commenters for the qualifying weekends. The experts will even get the opportunity to fly out to Iceland for the tournament finals!

If you'd like to apply to be a PvP expert for the tournament, you must e-mail CCP by 23:59 GMT on Feb. 28. You must be at least 21 years old, know your EVE PvP and be able to fly to Iceland on June 16 and be back on June 21. All of the necessary information can be found in the dev blog entry after the jump.

CCP CEO Hilmar Veigar Pétursson has announced that the company is accepting PLEX donations from EVE Online players to aid relief efforts in Haiti following last month's devastating earthquake. CCP will convert the PLEX donations into cash and give 100% of the proceeds to the Red Cross.

CCP is accepting donations until Feb. 15, so send in your PLEX as soon as possible if you'd like to participate in the fundraiser. You can read Pétursson's full letter after the jump.

CCP will be hosting a mass testing on Singularity on Jan. 27 at 17:00 UTC "in order to investigate the source of the current lag in large fleet fights." According to CCP Tanis, the test requires 100+ players to be a success.

More information on the test can be found in this thread on the official forums, or just keep reading after the jump.

EVE Online: Dominion 1.1 will be deployed on Jan. 21 during downtime from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. GMT. The patch will mark the debut of Supercarriers on Tranquility, which are outlined in this new dev blog entry on capital ships. You can read the full patch notes after the jump.

Another recent dev blog entry explains how the team updated the planet graphics in Dominion. Give it a read to see exactly how much work goes into making planets look realistic in EVE Online.

Just when you thought EVE Online's peak concurrent user record had hit its peak, more players decide to log on to keep pushing that number higher and higher. CCP announced on its Facebook page today that the new PCU record is 56,021, which shatters last week's peak of 54,446 players.

For a game that's more than six years old, EVE Online sure seems to be gaining in popularity. Are you one of the players adding to the peak concurrent user record? What are your thoughts on Dominion, EVE's latest expanion?

It looks like 2010 is already shaping up to be a great year for EVE Online. According to a new status message on the game's Facebook page, CCP hit a new peak concurrent user record of 54,446 players on Sunday.

The previous record for most players logged into the game at the same time was 54,181 on Dec. 6. The new record may only be an increase of 265 players, but it demonstrates that EVE Online is still going strong more than six years after its launch.

Fans of the EVE Chronicles may be sad to hear that the stories are going on a short sabbatical, but they'll be back before you know it on Jan. 11, 2010.

The EVE Chronicles "examine the various aspects of life in New Eden" through interesting stories that add to the lore of EVE Online. You can read more than 180 of these stories in the EVE Chronicles archives.