There are harwood floors that are installed in almost the identical way that laminate floors are:
-snaps together, no nails
-floats over old floor with thin material underneath
-substrate under wood is stable like laminate.
Some come with extensive wear warranties and can be refinished 2 times. With factory applied urethanes, these wood floors have incredible lifespans and offer your the beauty of real wood.
We had laminate in out old house. We installed it ourselves and had no problems. Wear knee pads.
I would never get it again. It’s slippery, cold feeling, and doesn’t really look like wood flooring, there’s no depth to it. If something does happen to the surface it can’t be repaired unlike wood that can just be refinished. We filled some nicks and a hole that my husband accidently drilled through it with wood putty then stained it the same color as the laminate. The repais were almost undetectable. Do not get it on stairs unless you want a broken neck.
If you do get it and put rugs down make sure you clean under the rugs often. Grains of sand and dirt get under the edge of the rug and wear off the surface of the laminate.
One more thing, if you tend to have a lot of liquid disasters I wouldn’t recommend it. Once my dog threw up under a table and we didn’t notice for a while (it was a dark area and the puddle was the same color as the floor). The edges of all the seams raised up and never went completely flat after drying. Also the hose burst on our dishwasher and overnight the whole floor was ruined.
This is a fair point. Mind you, carpets don’t tend to fair much better after such disasters either…
Ours is in a light colour… I think it was called maple.
We painted the walls and ceiling in our lounge room without using drop cloths, and the paint that spattered from the rollers (my technique is, apparently, not optimal) was wiped up with a damp cloth a day or so later. One larger dollop was lifted off with a butter knife. We’re still finding occasional flecks that I missed in the cleanup, but they scratch off with a finger nail - no staining left behind.
Oh, and I’ve woken up to find cat vomit, once. It had apparently happened in the wee small hours, and yet it cleaned up very well with paper towel and an application of soapy-cloth-with-disinfectant.
With regard to normal liquid (ie, not cat vomit) spills, I’m a very indifferent housekeeper, so unless something liquid is threatening a fabric nearby, I don’t stop what I’m doing to wipe up a spill - I figure that it’s not going anywhere, and I’ll get to it in a minute/hour/next morning. Not only paint, but black coffee, red wine and indian curry paste have all found their way to the floor at some point, and none of this has stained.
So far, anything that’s been dripped on the floor has been removable with a damp cloth and some dishwashing liquid (and to be honest, I don’t know if the dishwashing liquid was even necessary).
In my opinion, if laminate flooring can survive me, it can survive anything.
One thing to remember though - it is VERY important not to buy the crappy cheap laminate.
Spend the extra $$$ and pay what you’d expect to pay for good quality carpet, and you’ll get a great looking result that’s incredibly durable. If you cut corners and go for the cheap stuff, you’ll regret it.
Also, get a good quality underlay. With your floor insulated against the concrete slab you’ll find the flooring to be as warm underfoot as carpet (actually warmer in my case, since the cheap carpet that was here when we moved in had shoddy underlay and the carpet was practically sitting right on the concrete - it was freezing to walk on in winter).
I put cherry wood look Pergo in my kitchen when I remodeled 10 years ago.
I did the job myself, cut and nailed new subfloor, installed cabinets and then Pergo. The floor floats on and is not anchored. It took me most of a day to do my kitchen (10X 16 plus under dishwasher, stove, and refer)
Good:
Damp mop looks good as new
No wax, no muss
dog and kid proof
Up to 2 weeks ago looked great.
Bad:
Had a water line behind my fridge start to leak (slowly) my first clue was when the boards started to pucker at the seams. 
I may have to pull up the floor and replace it all.
It should be noted, that real hardwood probably would also be mcuh worse for the wear exposed to the same leak. Tile might have faired better.