"We went through dozens of iterations and finally settled upon a widescreen aspect ratio that best suited the gameplay experience," said 2K community manager Elizabeth Tobey in response to the scandal. "Once this FOV was established, we chose to keep exactly the same horizontal FOV for standard def displays, so as not to in any way alter the gameplay experience.

"Instead of cropping the FOV for 4:3 displays and making all 4:3 owners mad in doing so," she continued, "we slightly extended the vertical FOV for standard def mode: we never wanted to have black bars on people's displays... We felt that it best served our goal of keeping the game experience as close as possible to the original design and art vision on both types of displays.

"We did what we thought was the best thing for the game: developing and optimizing it for widescreen displays, and making the decision not to do the usual crop for 4:3 displays. As a consumer, you certainly have the right to disagree."

Some folks have already taken up arms in opposition, releasing an unofficial patch for the demo that increases the widescreen field of view.

Despite the controversy, Shacknews stands by its BioShock review score. We pledge to keep you updated from the Widescreen Situation Room as the Story of the Week continues.