Iceland-based Crowd Control Productions has today announced that phase seven of the beta testing on EVE: The Second Genesis has begun, and that a new server cluster for the game is now online. The new state-of-the-art servers will enable CCP to host up to 100,000 players in the same gameworld and--according to Nathan Richardson, project manager of EVE at Iceland telecommunications company Siminn who are running the server cluster and customer support--will cater equally for players in both North America and Europe.

　　"This is a very big milestone for EVE as we are getting close to the game going gold," said Reynir Hardarson, art director and cofounder of CCP Games. "We're pleased to announce that within a week's time we will be dropping the NDA for our beta testers. We cannot thank our testers enough for all their dedication and bug hunting to help make EVE the best MMOG this year."

　　EVE: The Second Genesis is scheduled for release in both North America and Europe on May 6, and anyone interested in joining the final phases of the game's beta testing can still do by registering at the game's official site. For more information, check out our previous coverage of the game.