I'm actually lost for words at some of the reactions here.
Going full widescreen is as valid a stylistic choice as choosing a monochrome palette, as in Limbo for example.
The main thing I suppose is that it challenges the notion that the number of dots that make up the image has any real meaning or value; People don't get up in arms when watching a 2:40:1 AR movie on blue-ray even though the image doesn't use the full 1080 pixels of height in the frame-buffer because its understood that the way an image is framed is a compositional tool.
However it seems in gaming we are stuck with this asinine, childish, view that its the number of pixels, not the quality of the image that is important.