There are some nice speakers that can fit nicely in a living room, but rears placement are always a problem. Especially if the sofa is isolated in the middle of the room. But my SO has enjoyed nice sounds so there was no struggle there (It was gradual with a 2.0 setup before the 5.1).
A lot of living rooms these days are terrible for surround sound, and sound listening in general. Big, “open concept” spaces without doors and walls, often with the “living room” area occupying an odd corner of the big open blah-space. No feasible way to correctly install and aim surrounds. Also sound insulation is generally quite poor unless you deliberately do it while building the house.
