There's a key difference: when a system is not performing at its best then you can have the 2 acoustics "fighting" each other. In my experience, at a higher quality level of replay the acoustic of the recording dominates, the acoustic of the listening space becomes subservient. There should be no need to focus on the acoustic of the recording in a directed way, it should just be: it stamps its authority on the room, and house, without any effort. Whether you have a square room or whatever, it will make no difference, because the ear/brain tunes into the stimulus with the greatest impact that makes auditory sense to your brain. And this will be the recording space, not your listening space ...Speaking for myself, if i am listening to 2 sets of reverb (one recorded and one in the room itself), that does not work as well for me, as in a [properly] damped room where i can focus on the recorded reverb a little better. close-miked is different. well set up, i dont care if its damped or lively cathedral-ceiling room.
I'll have to say I have been in rooms that have been very heavily treated for audio replay, and they are very strange places to me: they feel "uncomfortable", like I'm in a strange, large and disquieting box; not my cup of tea at all ...
Frank