Blizzard has no plans to raise the free version of World of Warcraft's level cap above 20, producer John Lagrave told CVG in an interview published today. He explained that Blizzard has examined the possibility and has chosen to keep the free level cap where it is. Blizzard is not beefing up World of Warcraft's free-to-play version.

　　"You know, we looked at it lots, we looked at whether level 20 would give you a good sense of what our game is, and we think it does," he said. "There's also a lot of things in the game that are special that we want to reserve for our paying customers."

　　Blizzard introduced the free and unlimited, but level-capped World of Warcraft Starter Edition last June. Players eager to progress further in the game need to pay the game's $15-per-month subscription fee.

　　Earlier this month, Activision reported that World of Warcraft's subscriber base had slipped to 9.1 million from the 10.2 million reported in February, a significantly more precipitous drop than from the 10.3 million figure published in September 2011. Activision is hoping for a subscription boost next month with the release of the Mists of Pandaria expansion.