I think the root of the problem is a lot of us are rocking the factory built-in stereo speakers on whatever set we have, including laptops, and basic headphones on everything else. The right answer is to run audio through some other bit of software or hardware to downmix surround to two channels, and/or apply a compressor. But none of that is stock or made at all clear as something the typical home-gamer is supposed to do. So we're left with media that is struggling to deliver an experience on hardware that just isn't built for it.