Why 1/3 of the screen?

[Jawn]

What's the story behind only using the central 1/3 of the screen? Why not expand the scroll window to the full width, or if you insist on seeing only a small amount of space to either side of the plane, why not rotate the whole scroll/view 90 degrees so it scrolls left / right? Having only 1# of the screen realestate actually dedicated to playing the game looks kinda weird and clumsy, TBH...
cheers
John