So I (and the original poster, I infer) am running full screen graphical so as to run a GNOME Desktop. So maybe the problem is related to the graphics subsystem. I'll "turn it off" (if you can say how to do that) as a diagnostic, but the point is to have HiDPI graphics running properly [can't stand Mac OS X, running Linux full screen is the reason I'm using VMware in the first place] so we'll want to figure that out if we can.
There's every possibility this isn't VMware Fusion's fault, but ideally a minor kernel upgrade wouldn't have caused such an abrupt change in behaviour. I'm certainly willing to help diagnose. Which graphics setting in the VM config do you want changed?
AfC